#uh anyways i hate the clone twist i will never not hate it i was so ready to be a bibi stan i was so let down 😭

[hecksupremechips]

When I think about Mizuki in aini it’s like, I know something is just so off about her but I have trouble articulating it. It’s really frustrating cuz she was like my favorite character in the first game and when I play the first game I feel like I have a really good idea of who she is as a character. Like she acts strong and and hangs out with people much older than her and has to take on a fuck ton of responsibility but she’s also just a kid she cuddles with a rabbit toy she raises fish in the fridge she can be kinda gullible in the way that kids are and she doesn’t always understand more mature jokes. She acts sassy and hostile towards Date but she’s described as kinda and compassionate by Hitomi and she defends the weak and loves her friends deeply and thinks Aiba is cute. She pokes fun at Date for being grumpy at the shrine and then excitedly holds his hand and drags him over to the offering box to pray for his safety and she gets scared when there’s danger and she hugs Date for comfort but then tries to brush it off because she was taught to feel shame whenever she required basic attention and affection. She was hurt badly by her biological family and finds herself at home with Date despite her fears of him not caring for her. Like she’s a really solid well rounded character with strengths and weaknesses and her story makes me feel every possible emotion known to man

Then I play aini and I was soooo excited to see that Mizuki was gonna be a protagonist and that she had Aiba (its what made me buy the game immediately after finishing the first game lol) and then like. I honestly can’t tell you a damn thing about her character in aini. Like she’s the protagonist for half that game and I can’t think of any particular struggles she has as a character or like any moments where she stands out. It’s like, I know this is Mizuki she has the same basic features of that character but she’s not really given much? And anything new you learn about her is just like, retcons of her already established and well written backstory that just. Really didn’t need to be made and honestly they just kinda do a disservice to her character

Like first off there’s the Bibi twist which. Oof. I have some pretty complicated feelings about Bibi in general like okay. When she appears as the masked woman I was totally on board and thought she was really interesting and I was so prepared for her to be a favorite character her somnium is probably my favorite one in the game. And then she was revealed to be Mizuki. And it was revealed that we were playing as her for half of the B side of the story and we didn’t know it. Like, where to even begin. They stopped writing Bibi as her own character and she pretty much just became Mizuki except idk, she has a bigger grudge against Ryuki and has a heart condition I guess. And like I think it really speaks to how flat Mizuki was in this game if we can play as two completely different characters and have them be indistinguishable. Bibi shouldn’t be anything like Mizuki, they’ve lived completely different lives. And I hate the clone twist like good god I really hate the clone twist because IT ADDS NOTHING TO MIZUKIS CHARACTER OR HER CONFLICT. In fact it like, actively goes against her arc from the first game??? Cuz like half the point of Date and Mizuki’s relationship is there to show that family isn’t what you’re born with, it’s what you make. Both Date and Mizuki feel like their little family can’t exist because they’ve been taught, like most of us have, that biological family is the most important and real and valid way to have a family. You’re supposed to love and respect your biological parents because they MADE you, and Date has to live with the anguish that he can’t be Mizuki’s REAL father because they aren’t blood related. So like, to pull the rug away and go "oh yeah btw I guess Mizuki was adopted lol" it just completely erases what made her story so impactful to most people. And the clone reveal adds nothing like Mizuki doesn’t NEED this at all she wasn’t looking to discover the truth of her backstory because. There wasn’t any truths that needed to be discovered, we already know her deal and so does she. And her having a clone doesn’t really fit with the half to whole theme cuz like, she wasn’t looking for a fucking clone or like a secret sister or anything like that. It’s just stupid it’s so stupid

What Mizuki needed was like, a new actual conflict that required her to overcome challenges and grow as a character. A lot of people, myself included, have complained about how her relationship with Date just isn’t talked about hardly at all, how he went missing for 6 years and they didn’t even get a proper reunion and the game kinda mocks you for wanting one. We dont get any context as to how Mizuki coped during that time like she was completely alone for the most major years of her life she was separated from the one person who was her real family and we don’t know what she felt during all that cuz the game refuses to talk about it. And there isn’t much indication that the adults care about this either, Boss maybe has a soft spot for her but that’s kinda the extent of it, she makes a joke that Date is probably off chilling in a hot spring in Atami so clearly no one is giving Date’s disappearance the weight it deserves. So like, we have this potential thing we could work with here like why is Mizuki a detective now and why does she care about this case? Because her dad was taken by tearer and has been gone for 6 years and she’s been all alone and she wants to find him and find out if he’s even alive and she wants to kick tearers ass cuz he tore (hehe) her family apart. And this can also give her an actual connection to Ryuki too like Ryuki is the one who betrayed Date and knew some shit about tearer and saw what happened to Date and he just never told Mizuki the truth and she’s spent all this time looking for Date so this would be like, pretty major conflict when it all gets revealed. And it actually gives what Ryuki did actual consequences that affect him cuz honestly the fact that no one seems to care that much about Date’s disappearance makes Ryuki’s guilt and depression seem completely fucking useless lol. So here we go, that’s some conflict for Mizuki to have and it gives her a personal connection to the case, we can add more to it but really even this alone is way more than what she’s given in the actual game. And I think just the big problem with her in aini is I think the writers were too afraid to do anything that could ruin her character or cause her to change too much so they just like. Didn’t write anything that could allow her to develop and instead just fucked with already established information about her which. I honestly don’t know how that is seen as better??? In what fucking world. It just feels really pointless to have even made Mizuki a protagonist to begin with since they don’t really do anything with her and lol I think the writers realized this so that’s why like. Ryuki gets all the character conflict but makes lowkey no progress in the case and the real investigation doesn’t happen until the Mizuki side cuz they needed to make up for the fact they didn’t write anything for her alskla

So yeah just to wrap things up, Mizuki just didn’t get to be a character in aini and she wasn’t given any interesting conflict despite how easy it would’ve been cuz the writers were too scared of doing anything with this character that could ruin her but dude. Dont fucking make her the protagonist then if you’re too scared of doing anything with her. Don’t piss me off like that

[shagpaboloutpost]

Some First Meetings

Widow and Wraith

"And this is Widow," Quaver said. "Everything I know about the base, they have opinions on."

Wraith looked at Widow. Widow raised an eyebrow as they looked him up and down. Wraith pretended not to see the way Quaver's lips were twitching.

"Wanna know what I think of you?" Widow asked finally.

"I'll wait until we know each other better," Wraith said. "I think right now I can guess pretty easily."

Quaver laughed and clapped Wraith on the back.

"They'll like you eventually," he said. "Probably after you've gone back to Coruscant, but it'll happen."

"Don't put words in my mouth, sir," Widow said with a smug smile.

Ty and Starcatcher

Ty hated personnel changes. It was hard enough getting everyone to get along when they'd known each other for months. Having to help a shiny adapt to Shag Pabol's eccentricities was never fun.

She'd wanted to reach out to one of her brothers in the 212th, see if they'd ever met the kid who'd been assigned to her, but neither one answered. So she knew only what the file could tell her about this new trooper: their number (5/358), how long they'd been deployed (just over two months), and any notable actions on the battlefield (none). It couldn't even tell her why this particular shiny was being reassigned so soon after deployment. She just hoped it wasn't anything too serious.

(Who was she kidding? She only got the problem troopers.)

But to her surprise, the kid that stepped off the transport seemed like a typical wide-eyed shiny. With a mullet they'd dyed dark blue and a friendly expression, they perked up at the sight of Ty.

"Starcatcher, sir, reporting for duty," the kid said cheerfully.

Ty smiled in spite of herself.

"I don't do sirs, Starcatcher. Come on. I'll give you a tour."

Starcatcher lingered for a second, glancing back at the ship that had dropped them off.

"Problem?"

"Sorry, uh - sergeant. I just... Like ships," Starcatcher said awkwardly.

Ty pressed her lips together to keep from laughing. There was the quirk she'd been waiting for. Given what she had to deal with from her other troopers, a fascination with flight would be easy.

Tibanna and Festival

"You're the new ordnance trooper! Come with me."

Tibanna didn't have time to say anything before the clone with the rainbow hair was pulling him down the hall.

"What is going on?" he asked, trying to pull free of their grip.

"I have fireworks," they said. "I need your help."

"No! Absolutely not!" Tibanna finally twisted free and stopped moving, glaring at the other clone. "You're going to get yourself killed."

"Not if I have an expert to help me," the other clone said patiently. "You ever seen a firework?"

"I've seen bombs," Tibanna said wryly. "I think anybody who thinks making them look pretty justifies having them is an idiot."

"You are not like I expected," they said, frowning at Tibanna. "Fine. For now. But the next time there's a holiday I expect you to at least show me how to set them off."

That was never going to happen. Tibanna forced a feeble smile and said nothing.

"Anyway, I'm Festival," the other clone said suddenly, like they just realized they'd never introduced themselves. "Welcome to the Shag Pabol Outpost."

"Tibanna," he said warily. He'd have to keep a close eye on Festival.

[livvyofthelake]

daffodil, camellia, jasmine 🫶

daffodil ⇢ do you have siblings? if yes, in what ways do you think you’re similar to or different from them?

i have an older sister, she is simultaneously my opposite and the closest thing to my clone you can get. i think as you get older you stop seeing so many differences between yourself and your siblings and instead begin to understand how you were like forged together or whatever. she’s way more of a real person than me though, she’s like got a life plan and friends and will have a career after grad school and i’m literally a teenage 21 year old girlblogger…. someday i’ll be house/dog sitting for her while she and her like lawyer husband go on a trip to mexico.

camellia ⇢ what were you like when you were younger? do you think you’ve changed a lot?

well i think i’ve been generally the same always. when i was a little kid i was a very off putting weirdo who hated boys on the grounds of them being boys and that potentially hindered my development due to uh. half the other kids i knew being subhuman in my eyes. if i seem like a misandrist now i need you all to understand i’ve actually made so many concessions and become so much less of one since i was a kid it’s ridiculous. anyway other than that the only major way i’ve changed since being a kid is like, learning social skills so i’m NOT an off putting freak anymore. and also learning confidence. 13 year old me had NONE, i however, am a narcissist for no reason except that i’m literally the coolest smartest hottest funniest most interesting person alive <3

jasmine ⇢ do you have a movie or book you loved but will never watch/read again?

well there are many books i seemingly will not read again due to being illiterate. but specifically i think the glass arrow by kristen simmons was an insane book for me to read at like 16, absolutely fucked me up. and i’ve never reread it because it would make me insane. idk if i’d recommend it, from what i remember it’s very much a product of its time and my specific age really lent itself to enjoying the story. it’s like a twist on the dystopia genre, which was falling out of favor when the book was published and it made sense then but now would be weird probably. as for a movie. whiplash. genuinely great movie, had a hell of a time watching it, absolutely loved it, never watching it again because my whole body was so tense for the entire runtime and it stressed me out to the point of wanting to throw up <3 like literally 10/10 though fuck off johnny utah turn my pages bitch!!

[chokemeanakin]

Anakin xJedi! Reader with a jealous Anakin? Maybe he's a bit ... aggressive dominator?

thank you for the request, I didn’t think it’d turn out so 🥴💀, so ty for causing the fic that signs my ticket to hell. I’m probably overhyping it but my vanilla ass is like “pêñïś?? 😱 down she goes😤🔥”

anyway tw: THEY DO THE SEX (also there’s some choking oop)

Masterlist

Read it on ao3

Say My Name- Anakin Skywalker X fem Reader (smut)

You and Anakin had been sent on a mission to Axalore. It was an important ally planet to the Republic, and their leader Tonkruda had been captured by Count Dooku. It took a lot of clones, bombs, and one too many failed rescue attempts, but finally you managed to steal Tonkruda back and drive Dooku and his fleet of droids away from the planet.

As a thanks, the people of Axalore threw a party for you, Anakin, and your battalion of clones. It was held in the capital building ball room, although it was an informal event where every citizen was invited to get drunk, dance, and make a fool of themselves in front of their Jedi hero’s.

You and Anakin were sitting at a table in the pub, accepting all the drinks people were throwing your way and sipping on each of them sparingly. You wanted to have fun, but you still had to be on guard in case there was any separatist retaliation. You were tasting one of the blue drinks when you heard a voice coming from above you.

“Is someone sitting here?” A man asked, pointing to the spot next to you. He was young and handsome in every generic sense of the word— tall, short blonde hair, a strong jawline... not that it mattered any. Anakin was 50 shades of gorgeous, sitting right next to you, and all yours— in secret, that is.

But you didn’t want to be rude, so you shook your head and gestured for the man to sit.

He began with small talk, and you lazily indulged him. He took every opportunity to slide closer to you, to touch you innocently on the shoulder or knee, to bump his shoulder with you. Each time, Anakin’s eyes shot to you two like a hawk. You didn’t see at first what this guy was doing, but after he said, “So, I hope you don’t mind me asking... that whole thing where ‘Jedi can’t have attachments?’ Is it true?” you started to get a hint.

“It’s true,” Anakin answered through grit teeth, fingers clenched on the glass in his hand. Fortunately it wasn’t his metal hand, or there would be glass shards all over the floor by now.

The man, who’s name you learned was Rhondamalo, shot Anakin a side-eye, then leaned into you so only you could hear, “You wanna ditch this dude and go back to my place to set up a ‘no strings attached’ agreement?”

The glass in Anakin’s hand did end up shattering, pebbling over the floor as the drink he had been holding splashed onto the ground. While your force-telepathy skills were like most Jedi, who could only read people’s emotions, Anakin’s was much stronger and most definitely allowed him to hear exactly what Rhondamalo had just said to you from his mind.

Both of your attentions shot to Anakin, and you started panicking when you saw his face. His gaze was like two icy daggers, digging deep into Rhondamalo’s eyes.

“I, uh, I’m sorry,” you tried to defuse the situation quickly. “I can’t go with you Rhondamalo. It would be wrong of me and—“

“You will go home,” Anakin growled darkly, “And forget you even met her.”

He was using force persuasion. Rhondamalo blinked a couple times, dazed. Then he looked at the drink in his hand, then you, confusion stretched across his face.

“Sorry, do I know y— you know what, I think it’s time for me to head home,” he blinked a couple more times, then got up and headed for the doors.

You shot Anakin a glare. “You didn’t have to do that, you know. I was going to reject him anyways.”

Anakin’s face was still twisted in disgust. “You should have heard the things he was thinking about you. He’s lucky he got away with just the persuasion technique.”

“You went digging through his mind? You know you’re not supposed to do that!”

Anakin didn’t answer you, instead he stood up as well. His boots crunched on the glass as he grabbed your wrist in his leather glove, pulling you to your feet. He didn’t turn to look at you as he walked you two briskly toward the exit.

“Where are we going? You can’t just drag me around whenever you’re unhappy.” You tried pulling your wrist out of his grip, but he held on tight. “You think I was really going to let Rhondamalo have any time of day? You know, maybe I should have, I bet he wouldn’t have had to drag it out of me like you are.”

“It wasn’t you I was worried about,” he stalked next door with you in tow, shoving open the doors to the townhouse Tonkruda was letting you two occupy for the night. “But now you’re making me question that idea.”

“Your jealousy is clouding your vision, Anakin. You’re not thinking straight.”

“Do you have any idea how hard it is for me to keep this thing a secret between us?” Anakin spoke fiercely, shutting the door behind you a little too hard. “Do you know how much pain it causes me that every time we go out in public, I have to feel what people are thinking about you? Hear what people are thinking about you? And all I ever want to do is pull you in close and show them what’s mine.”

He backed you against the wall as he said this, head tilted in a predatory way. You swallowed nervously when your back hit the wall, scared at the eyes that were boring into you. Where had your sweet Ani gone? He was so tense, so full of hate, his eyes clouded with anger and lust.

“You wanna know what the most painful part is? You want to know what makes me fantasize about losing control on each and every person that has ever had a single perverted thought about you? Hm?” You blink at him, and he doesn’t wait for you to answer. “It’s that I can’t do a single thing about it.”

His voice was soft suddenly, low and raspy. In a way, it made it even more terrifying. Chills travelled down your spine as he trailed a finger across your hairline, down your temple, tracing over your cheek and tickling the sensitive skin by your ear.

Your head was abruptly wrenched upward as he took your jaw in his hands, forcing your lips up so that they were ghosting over his.

“Say his name.”

It took you a moment to find your voice. You’ve never seen Anakin like this, so angry, so feral, so off-hinge. “W-who?”

“Him. From the party.”

“Rhondamalo?”

Anakin’s lips curled into a snarl. He forced your chin to the side, then slid his hand down your jaw until it was locked around your throat, holding you still. You were trapped. He had you smothered against the wall, leaving no room to breathe between his own body pressed into yours and the hand squeezing your throat.

Your skin was burning, heat pooling in your cheeks and between your legs, only cooled by the hint of Anakin’s breath on your ear.

“I’m going to make you scream my name so hard, you forget he even had one.”

Your legs turned to jello then, and you were suddenly very thankful for the way he had you locked in his embrace. Otherwise, you were pretty sure you’d be a boneless pile on the floor by now.

This rough side of Anakin... you didn’t see it very often. He was always so sweet, so soft, a hopeless romantic at heart. His favorite thing was to take care of you gently, carefully, to make sure you knew that you were appreciated and loved. However, you’d be lying if you said you didn’t like this side of him— the one that only knew how to take.

“I don’t know...” you swallowed your nerves, deciding that no matter how much it scared you, you wanted to test this side of him— to see just how far he would go. “You should know I have a pretty stellar memory.”

You suddenly became aware of the hand that wasn’t locking you to the wall by the throat— the hard one covered in leather— as it began trailing down your body, adding kindling to the fire that had already spread wild within you.

“We’ll see about that,” he promised, capturing your earlobe between his teeth and nibbling lightly.

Your vision clouded over as he slipped his gloved hand into your pants, applying an immediate, hard pressure directly onto your clit. It pulsed against his touch, throbbing in time with your heart.

Anakin tilted your neck further to the side, lips marking a trail down the exposed skin. He chuckled against the junction of your neck and shoulder, scraping his teeth against the skin before biting down hard. “I can feel how desperate you are for me,” he purred, licking over the mark he just made. “I can feel your heart beating against my fingertips.”

You couldn’t stop the helpless sound from escaping your throat. You wanted so desperately to grab onto Anakin, to force him to give you back an inch of control in any way you could. It was in your nature— you were never one to submit without a fight. But when you tried to lift your arms, you found that they, too had been pinned fast to the wall. A new spike of fear and arousal shot down your spine as you now realized you were truly trapped, immobilized by his hands and the force, unable to escape whatever you had coming your way.

He kissed the thin skin over your pulse, then lifted his molten gaze to look at you. “What was his name again?”

“Rhondamalo.”

Two fingers were shoved inside of you. You were more than ready for them, dripping wet since he’d cornered you against the wall. The sudden stretch left you with a burn though, bordering on painful before it turned into pleasure as he pulled his fingers out and rocked them back into you, twisting them in search of that spot.

You weren’t sure whether it was the lack of oxygen going to your brain, or if it was the feeling of the unfamiliar, stiff fingers buried inside of you that made your head go dizzy. He had never used his gloved hand on you like this before, but it was slowly becoming a new favorite.

He pulled his fingers out of you and you chased them, pushing back down onto them eagerly. He tutted disapprovingly, and suddenly you couldn’t move your hips anymore.

“You want me so bad all of a sudden? You get what I give you.”

He pressed his fingers in as deep as they would go, hitting your clit with his palm at the same time he curled his fingers just right. You cried out, unable to do anything but take it as he massaged the leather fingertips into your sweet spot.

“You like that, sweetheart? I bet that guy at the party wouldn’t have treated you this good. Remind me who again?”

Your head was fuzzy from lack of oxygen, the only thing you were able to think about was the fingers buried deep in your leaking cunt.

“Rhom- rhomaldo?” You guessed. “Rhomohaldo? Rhondamalo.”

Anakin released the pressure from your g-spot, but kept his fingers inside of you. “Looks like I’m not doing a good enough job,” he mused, and then let go of your throat.

You tried to pull in as much air into your lungs as you could, but it was cut off again as an invisible force took its place.

Anakin bent to his knees in front of you, using his free hand to pull your pants down and urge your legs apart. He began moving his fingers inside of you again, purposefully missing the part that he knew would make you go crazy each time.

“So pretty...,” he praised, watching his fingers disappear in and out of you. “You should see the mess you’re making. It’s dripping down your thighs.”

You could feel it— the thick beads of your arousal, oozing down the insides of your legs like honey. Your legs had been closed earlier and it had smeared all over the place. Anakin leaned his head forward and cleaned some of it up with his tongue.

You were breathing too fast. The room began to swim, black dots spotting your vision. Every other sensation was numb except for what Anakin was making you feel below.

He licked his way up the inside of your right thigh, and then the left. Once he had cleaned all of your slick off, his wandering tongue made it to your heat and he wasted no time in flicking your clit with it.

“Fuck fuck fuck,” you keened, voice breaking. He began fucking you with his fingers again, hitting your sweet spot and focusing his tongue on massaging your clit.

“Say his name again,” he commanded, lips wrapping around your nub and sucking harshly.

“I— I um.. Rhon... Rhonda... “ you lost your train of thought. He curled his fingers, digging deeper into you with each thrust.

“I can’t,” you whimpered. There was nothing else in your mind but the man on his knees before you, coaxing the lewdest sounds from you with his fingers. He broke away from your pussy, a pleased smirk on his glistening lips.

“Progress,” he stood to his full height, looming over you again. “But still not good enough.”

Everything keeping you immobilized and pinned to the wall released suddenly, and you fell forward into Anakin’s chest. He caught you and all but carried you to the bedroom, pressing you into the bed so that you were on your stomach.

You wriggled around impatiently as you listened to his clothes drop onto the floor, arching your back so that your hole was presented to him. It was aching to be filled again, clenching emptily around the juices still spilling from it.

Anakin was on you in an instant, his hard member sliding through your folds. You shifted your hips to get him closer to where you wanted him to be, but he covered your back with his front and pressed you flat into the mattress, rendering you immobile again.

“You get what I give you,” he reminded you, wrapping your hair around his hand and pulling it so that your neck was exposed to his sharp teeth. “Remember that.”

You hummed your understanding, deciding that it was better to appease him and get what you wanted than argue and continue this torture for longer. He wrapped his hands around his length and massaged the head into your clit, so warm and wet and good. Your fingers clenched onto the bedsheets before you, breathing becoming more and more labored as he slid it back to your hole, teasing you with it.

“What do you say?”

“Please,” there was no point in arguing.

“Please what?”

“Please, fuck me.”

Anakin grunted in approval, then slammed into you. You cried out, grasping at the bed sheets as he pulled your hair harder. He didn’t bother starting off slow to stretch you out into accommodating his large size. Your pussy ached at the feeling of being stuffed so full, the pain so intense, so delicious as he fucked into you at that punishing pace...

“Now say my name.”

He was on top of you, inside of you, all around you. “Anakin.”

“Hm? What was that baby? I couldn’t hear you.”

“Anakin!”

“That’s a good girl.”

He released your hair, and lifted himself from your chest. One hand smoothed down your back, keeping you pressed to the bed in warning. You could breathe again, for a moment at least, before both of his hands fell to your hips and lifted so that he could get a better angle, and he began fucking into you with strokes that punched the air straight out of your lungs.

Your lips could only form his name. Over and over and over again, as he took you from behind with a violence you’d only ever seen him use on the battlefield. He was merciless, his cock pushing into you at an angle where he hit your sweet spot every time. He slammed into it over and over, his hips driving into your ass so hard and so fast that you knew you’d have bruises on the flesh there in the morning. Likewise, his fingers were digging into your waist, squeezing you hard and keeping you from shooting forward with each forceful thrust.

Where you were used to having the slow warmth that formed in your stomach slowly coaxed out of you, now it was being ripped from the depths of your body. Anakin was dragging it out of you, forcing you to feel it, to submit to it. You buried your face into the mattress to muffle your screams, but he sacrificed a hand to pull your hair again, freeing your head from the bed.

“Let me hear you, sweetheart,” he demanded through panting breaths. “And I only want my name coming from those lips.”

You did as he said, chanting his name over and over again, begging him to make you cum. He pulled you against him particularly hard, his cock pressed deep against the spot that made you see white, grinding himself into it. Your vision left you as his name tore from your throat one last time, muscles spasming and the walls of your heat clenching around his cock.

Slick spilled from your hole, drenching your thighs and dripping onto the bed. He fucked you through it, pulsing inside you himself as he filled you up with his hot cum. His ragged moans behind you mixed with your broken cries, slowing his pace until you were both spent, sweaty, and exhausted.

He pulled his softening length out of you, leaving you to lie boneless on the bed. He let you bury your head into the sheets this time, allowing you a moment to recover mentally. His hands couldn’t help but wander, though, as he was entranced by the white liquid leaking out of your hole. He pushed it back in with his fingers, marveling in the way your hips jolted at the feeling.

“Sorry,” he murmured, although you could tell he didn’t really mean it.

“‘S okay.”

You were sore, there was no doubt about it, and still twitching with aftershocks. Minding this, he glided his thumb from your hole to your clit, spreading his cum over it gently, tenderly. Like a switch had been flipped, he was back to his sweet, loving self.

“You don’t have to prove anything to me,” you lifted your head from the mattress to say. He removed his hand from you and you closed your legs, rolling over to curl up into his side. “I’ll always be yours, whether the whole world knows it or not.”

Anakin wrapped an arm around you instinctively. His chest glistened with sweat, but his eyes were now free of that jealous haze.

“Good,” he pressed his lips into your forehead, cementing the statement. No other words needed to be said. He had— quite literally— already fucked them out of you.

[zootopiathingz]

Inner Demons

The subconscious is a mysterious place.

As he searched his surroundings, all he saw was darkness. Nothing but a black empty void surrounded him on all ends. He wasn't sure if he was walking forward or back, and if he was walking toward something or further from it. Nick wasn't afraid, not anymore. He was quite familiar with this dark place. It was part of a recurring nightmare he had every now and then, ever since he was a child.

It never used to bother him that much after a couple years. He'd grown accustomed to its strange occurrences, and it usually played out the same every time so there was hardly any surprises. Nothing scared him or stressed him out. He just dreaded it every time, mostly because of the voice that would speak to him. It sounded like him, but with a much deeper and more disturbing tone. He just assumed it was what most mammals called the "inner demon".

But this time he was a bit worried. He hadn't been in this place since meeting his girlfriend two years ago, so now he didn't know what was to come from this dream. Maybe it would just be the same old, same old. But Nick had a terrible feeling that wasn't the case.

"Alright, let's just get this over with." He said aloud to whoever was listening. "What do you want now?"

He heard a small chuckle that echoed around him, causing a slight breeze to pass by.

Well, it seems we meet again.

Nick sighed wearily, rolling his eyes. "Yeah, yeah. You say that every time. Let me guess, you're here to tell me everything that's wrong with me and that I'll never be good for anything so there's no use in trying."

Silence was followed.

He scoffed, feeling a bit smug now. The voice had never not had a response before. Perhaps this was a sign he was finally conquering it. "Yeah, that's right. You've said it all before, it doesn't bother me anymore."

You're a lot more confident this time. But your smell..it's off.

"My what?" Nick asked, raising a brow. What the hell did it mean by his 'smell'? Did he give off a scent that the voice was used to?

Yes, you reek of...rabbit.

Nick's face went blank. "Wh..what do you mean?" He dared to ask.

Oh, that's right. You have that little partner of yours now. I had forgotten about her. No wonder you seem softer now.

"Softer?" He asked, putting his paw on his hip. "You know what, it doesn't matter. Can you just get your little speech over with so I can wake up and get back to my life?"

It was true, there was nothing it could say that Nick wasn't used to hearing. Hopefully this was the end of this nightmare, for good. Now that it's words didn't affect him, it would no longer have power. And that would be it.

But it seemed the voice had other plans.

Mmm, no. I say let's make this a little more interesting.

Nick's brows furrowed in suspicion. But before he had the chance to ask questions, he saw the blackness beginning to crumble. It shook the area, but it wasn't enough to make him need to duck and cover.

As the walls fell down, a much different scenery appeared around him. It was brighter, greener, and calmer. Once all the debris was gone and faded, he looked around to see he was somewhere in Zootopia, somewhere he actually recognized almost right away. There was some grass patches and rocks, and above him was an old stone bridge with moss growing out of it.

"Ah, geez." He said dreadfully. "Look whatever you're planning isn't gonna work!" He pointed upward, assuming that's where the voice was hiding. "I'm onto you!"

"Nick?"

His ears jolted up as he heard that familiar voice. It wasn't his inner demon, that was for sure. This voice was softer and more gentle. He would know it anywhere.

"Carrots!" He said, turning around to find the bunny standing on the opposite side of the under bridge. She looked so real and lifelike, almost like he could actually touch her. And maybe he could, but he knew this was no doubt a trick, and he didn't want to fall for it.

"Nick, what's going on? Why are you standing over there?" Judy asked, gesturing for him to come closer to her. "Come over here."

Just as Nick took a step toward her, his suspicions rose again. What if he got too close and the inner demon hurt him again? What if this was just another trap set for him to fall in? Most twisted of all, it was using Judy as bait to lure him in.

"Uh, I'm sorry but I um, I can't." He said, reluctant to get any closer to her, so he kept his feet perfectly still on the ground.

Judy frowned, "Why not?"

Now he felt bad. That look on her face was all too real. It looked exactly like her actual frown. And he hated seeing her upset. "Normally any other time I would, but right now there's something going on and I just can't."

She sighed, "Why do you always do this?"

"Do what?" He asked, feeling his nerves starting to creep up on him.

"Distance yourself." She answered, holding her arms. "Whenever I think that you've finally gotten used to being around me, you go and push me away. I understand you need space sometimes, but you don't need to act like it's the worst thing to let me help you."

Nick could hardly form a sentence in response to what she said. It was her voice, and it sounded just like her. But it didn't seem like her at all. She wouldn't ever actually say that to him.

Would she?

"Wh-what are you talking about? I don't push you away." He said, making it clear how much more nervous he was feeling.

"Yes, you do." She said, turning away. "It's like you're afraid to get too close to me. I just don't know if I can take it anymore, Nick."

His breath hitched for a second. He feared letting out another exhale, as if somehow breathing was going to make her walk away and leave him. "Wait, what? What are you saying?"

Judy sighed again, relaxing her shoulders from the scrunched position they were in. "I'm sorry, Nick. But I need to be with someone who's not afraid to talk to me, someone who won't push me away when they need my help."

"Wait, Carrots, don't!" He said, becoming desperate. Now he knew where this was going, and he didn't care for it one bit. Why would she do this? He didn't push her away that much, did he?

Then again, it was pretty hard to get close to others ever since the incident with the junior ranger scouts when he was little. The mammals he thought were his friends ended up hurting him in more ways than one. But Judy would never do anything like that him. So why did he still not fully trust her?

You're not good enough for her, anyway.

There it was. The voice from before, the voice from all these years starting to torture him again. Why was he not surprised?

Nick ignored it and dared to take a step closer to the bunny. "Carrots, please. I promise I'll try harder. You just have understand that it's hard for me to trust others."

It’s no use. She’s gonna leave you just like everyone else.

"I know, I know. But you've been saying that for two years." Judy said, tugging on the sleeves of her shirt. "How much longer do I have to wait?"

She deserves better than you. After all, you're just a no-good, lying fox.

Nick groaned in frustration, trying to shake away its words the best he could. But the voice was getting louder and harder to tune out. "Ugh, just stay out of this." He gritted his teeth.

You were never good enough. You never will be. And it's clear that she knows it, too.

"Just stop! You're lying!" He exclaimed.

"I'm not lying, Nick." Judy said, catching him off-guard. He didn't realize she could hear him talking to the voice.

Nick shook his head and paws, "No, no, I didn't mean— I, look I don't know what to do, okay? This is just..it's really hard for me! I know it's hard for you too but if you give me a chance, I promise I'll do better."

Judy sighed sadly, lowering her head. "You've said that before. Now I just don't believe you." She turned around, facing her back toward him. "I'm sorry, Nick."

He felt his heart sink to his stomach as she started to walk away. With every step he took, he saw the ground beneath her turn darker, creating an unsettling path. Even the grass within close distance turned brown and crinkly.

It was never going to last. How could a bunny ever love a fox?

Nick couldn't bare to see her go. Tears started forming in his eyes as he stepped out from under the bridge. "Carrots, wait! Don't leave!" He called out in desperation. "Just give me one more chance, I promise it'll be different! Carrots!"

Don't bother. She's gone, as she should be.

"This is all your fault!" He said angrily, looking up at the sky. "If you didn't torment me all these years, I could've given her what she deserves! I wouldn't be so afraid of getting close to everyone! And now you've taken away the one thing I care about most!"

Oh, you thought that was me taking her away?

It laughed. Nick didn't like that sound, it was spine-chilling. It made him uncomfortable beyond description. He never heard the voice laugh before, and something told him he wasn't going to like whatever followed.

Then, something else caught his attention. He gasped as he looked up at the bridge, spotting a red fox—that looked exactly like him—on all fours, growling deeply. As if that wasn't disturbing enough to look at, he also noticed that the fox was staring at something in the distance. And Nick knew exactly what it was. Or, rather who it was.

"No.." He whispered, turning around to glance at Judy again.

Immediately, the fox leapt down from the bridge and bolted toward the bunny at lightning speed.

"Judy, RUN!" He shouted loudly, making a run for it toward the scene. If he couldn't stop Judy from breaking it off with him, at least he could try and save her from whatever savage clone this was.

Judy didn't hear him, though. In fact she only realized what was happening once she heard a loud growl from behind her. She turned around and gasped, coming face to face with an angry fox that was darting toward her faster than the speed of sound.

Before Nick could catch up in time, the clone pounced on the rabbit and raised its paw up to slash its nails right into her face. She let out a horrific scream, unable to do anything to stop its assault.

Nick had to force himself to keep running, even though he almost froze for a second. The sounds of her agony made both his heart stop and his blood boil. And seeing a clone of himself hurting her in such a way only made it worse. He quickened his pace and eventually caught up to them before any more harm was caused.

He jumped onto the clone, pushing it off of Judy and pinning it to the ground. It squirmed and snarled, but otherwise was unable to fight back. Honestly it barely tried. "You son of a bitch!" He spat angrily, keeping its head against the dirt. "Stay away from her!"

It bared its teeth in response, now going still beneath him. Nick wasn't sure why it wasn't trying to escape, or why it hadn't just somehow disappeared, since this was obviously just the inner demon's creation. But that didn't matter right now.

He turned to look at Judy, who was sitting up and holding her face where she had been scratched. "Carrots! Are you okay?" He asked worriedly.

Judy slowly removed her paw, revealing the large gashes of blood over her eye and on her cheek. Oh god, it was worse than he thought. How could three claws cause so much damage to another animal?

She sniffed, as if she was about to cry. But when she opened her eyes to look at him, all he saw was resentment, and a hint of fear. She tried to scoot away, keeping a distance between them with the little strength she had.

"You really are a monster!"

Her words hit hard, like a knife to his chest. They rang in his ears to a point where it was all he could hear. They repeated, over and over until they were the only words he knew existed. He felt his whole body go numb, and his entire world crashed. The once calm and peaceful landscape around them went dark, and eventually turned to blackness again.

"N-no." Nick whispered, his eyes becoming watery. "No, I-I'm not a monster!"

He glanced down to look at the clone again, only to see that it was no longer there. In fact, the place he was in had changed. As it turned out, he was the one on the ground in the pinned position. He was the savage fox now.

"No, no, no, no. Wait, I- I didn't mean it." He said, starting to feel panicked and afraid. Judy just turned away, her figure turning into a silhouette of his cruel imagination. "Judy, wait please! I would never hurt you! You know that! Come back!"

No amount of begging was able to stop her from fading away. Now he was alone yet again in the endless void of darkness and isolation. He tried to move, but he was stuck. It felt like there were invisible chains holding him down—which knowing his imagination, that was probably the case.

"Judy wait! Please!" Nick shouted, even though he knew it was pointless. He heard the voice laugh yet again, this time it was louder and painfully obvious that it was up to no good.

It said nothing. Just laughed and laughed in a sickening taunt. The laughter only grew louder the more Nick struggled and squirmed in place, trying to flee from whatever trap he was in. And most cruelly of all, a muzzle was somehow making its way onto his face, right over his snout.

"No! No!" He cried out, feeling the muzzle straps tighten behind his head, which was starting to prevent him from opening his mouth anymore. He was stuck, helpless, and alone with nothing to stop his suffering.

Before the muzzle was completely strapped on, he tried one last time to call out for help. Despite the voice's laugh being obnoxiously loud, he knew deep down someone would hear him, somehow.

"JUDY!"

…

"Nick?"

Nick opened his eyes, letting out a small gasp. He sat straight up, taking a look around him, and taking in the fact that he could actually move. He observed his surroundings as he came back to reality, realizing he was in the safety of his bedroom with Judy sitting next to him in bed.

Even though he knew it was a dream in the beginning, it gradually felt more and more real to him. That had to have been the most disturbingly twisted dream he ever had.

"Nick, what's wrong?" He heard Judy ask, sounding quite concerned. "You were talking in your sleep."

He nodded, rubbing the side of his head as he tried to grasp everything that just happened. It felt like a blur, yet it played out so vividly in his head as he recapped it all. "Yeah, yeah I'm fine."

"Are you sure?" She asked, scooting closer to him. "It sounded like you were having a nightmare. You were saying my name; my actual name. And you never do that."

Nick nodded again, keeping as little eye contact with her as he could. He honestly didn't want to get into it. Talking about the dream would just feel too weird. He never openly discussed his nightmares with anyone. And telling her that he heard a voice every now and then? She would think he was insane.

"Yeah, I'm good. Trust me." He said. But despite his efforts to hide it, he knew she didn't believe him.

Still, she didn't want to pry. If he wanted to talk about it, he would, at his own pace. She had to respect that.

"Okay, if you say so." She gave him a nod.

However, now that Judy had agreed to leave him be, something didn't feel right. He did tend to push this like this aside like it was nothing, when in fact it did bother him. Maybe he really did push her away when he needed her. Maybe he had this dream for a reason. His subconscious was trying to warn him.

He didn't want to be the reason Judy felt useless. He didn't want to push her away and make her feel like he didn't trust her. It was the opposite, actually. He trusted her more than anyone. She had to know that, right?

Before Judy could lay back down, Nick wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close against him. She was surprised at first, but didn't hesitate to give in and return the affection. As a matter of fact, she felt relieved that he was able to be more open with his actions.

"Actually I— I'd like to talk about it, if that's okay." He said quietly, resting his chin on top of her head.

Judy smiled softly, nuzzling her face against his fur. "Of course."

[theres-an-impulstor-among-us]

Vaunna my beloved ❤

After your amazing Wels and Hels armorstand scene on my server could I get Wels and Hels story? Please? 👉👈

Oca my beloved ❤️

This is genuinely one of my favourite oneshots I’ve written. I just love the Wels/Hels dynamic so much. 

Also this is technically a sequel to the last one I wrote so go read it here if you like! This one does make sense without it tho

...

  It’s been a few weeks since the server has seen an evil hermit incident, and even though most of the hermits have let down their guard, Welsknight hasn’t. He hasn’t stopped being vigilant since his last encounter with Helsknight. He knows that his evil counterpart is out there somewhere, waiting for another chance to kill him. 

  Wels knows he can’t give him that chance. 

  One morning, while out in the desert, grinding for sand, Wels keeps spotting movement out the corner of his eye but every time he looks, he sees nothing. At first, he thinks it’s just the desert playing tricks on his mind. But his knight training tells him not to be so quick to jump to conclusions. 

  Eventually, he decides to put most of his stuff in a chest and go have a look, just in case. He leaves his valuables in the chest and explores the immediate area, looking carefully for any threats.

  He hears the sound behind him and twists to the side, a split second before a figure appears out of nowhere and attempts to shove him to the ground. 

  Wels jumps back a few steps and raises his diamond pickaxe, realising too late he accidentally brought it instead of his sword. “Helsknight.”

  His evil counterpart grins. “Hey, Welsy. Your face is looking great.”

  Wels’s hand automatically rises to his cheek, where the burn scar from their last encounter still sits. “Thanks. What are you doing here?”

  “I’m here for you, of course. It’s time we have another little battle, don’t you think?”

  Normally, Wels wouldn’t hesitate to stay and fight. But he doesn’t have a real weapon and his inventory is practically empty. 

  So he bolts back towards his chest, intending to grab his sword for a proper battle. But then he realises he may be running directly into a trap, so he changes direction.

  However, at that moment, the ground under his feet gives way, sending him tumbling down into the hole below.

  His fall seems to last only a few seconds but it must be far; when he hits the ground, pain explodes through his whole body. He’s fallen very far. 

  A second after he lands, he hears a splash from nearby and glances up. With the sunlight streaming through the hole, he can see a figure emerging from a single source block of water to his left. His heart skips a beat. 

  “You idiot!” Hels snaps, tossing the bucket at the wall. “You triggered the trap too soon! I wasn’t out of the way yet!”

  “Oh, I’m sorry!” Wels’s voice is strained from pain but his anger is unmistakable. “You’re right; I should have been able to avoid the secret trap you set up for me. Dang it. But hey, at least I’m not now stuck in a hole in terrible pain with next to no resources! That sure wouldn’t be ideal!”

  Hels glares at him. “Quit it with the sarcasm. This is all your fault.”

  Wels feels indignance boil inside him but he forces himself not to rise to the bait. His rational mind knows there’s no point arguing with Hels. “Whatever. I’m gonna see if my friends will come save me.”

  He taps out a message to the server asking for help, and within a minute, he gets replies from both Etho and Joe.

  “They’re on their way,” he says. “You may as well relax, cuz we’re not going anywhere ‘til then.”

  Hels huffs and sits down a few blocks away from Wels, crossing his arms irritably. 

  They sit in silence for a long time. The sun crosses the sky above them, marking the end of the morning and the start of the afternoon. 

  After a while, Wels decides to try and be practical. He checks his inventory; all he has on him is his diamond pickaxe, sixteen obsidian, a flint and steel, a single piece of bread, and some seeds. Nothing particularly useful. There aren’t enough blocks to pillar out, and Wels can hardly move while sitting, let alone standing, anyway. He could make a nether portal, but what would be the point? There’s no way he can survive better in the nether than in this pit right now. 

  He glances up. “Hels, do you have-.”

  “I don’t have anything on me, useful or otherwise,” says Hels immediately.

  Wels knows this means he doesn’t have food on him either. He can tell from the pouty expression on Hels’s face that his counterpart is hungry. Even though Wels’s hunger was reduced somewhat by the fall, he decides to be the bigger person. 

 He breaks his loaf of bread in half and offers the bigger part to Hels, who eyes him suspiciously. “What are you doing?”

  Frowning confusedly, Wels replies, “Giving you some bread.”

  “Why?”

  “...because we both need food?”

  “Yeah, so why don’t you just eat it all? You’ll be fuller.”

  “But you won’t have any.” Wels shakes his hand. “Just take it.” 

  Hels continues to scowl at him. “Is it poisoned?”

  Sighing and rolling his eyes, Wels flicks the piece of bread into Hels’s lap and starts slowly eating his own. Out the corner of his eye, he watches Hels carefully inspect the bread before taking a hesitant bite. Finally satisfied that he isn’t being tricked, Hels starts to gobble the bread.

  Wels watches him curiously. “Why would I try to poison you, Hels?”

  Hels shrugs. “We’re enemies, isn’t that what we do? Try to kill each other?”

  “No,” Wels says. “That’s the way YOU see our relationship. I never wanted to be enemies with you, you know.”

  “Really? Wasn’t it you who started all this?”

  “No, you literally turned up out of the blue and dropped me in a hole one day. Then I destroyed you in a rap battle. Remember that?”

  “I remember the hole,” says Hels. “Don’t remember losing any rap battle.”

  “Uh huh.”

  The two fall into silence as they eat. Wels continues to watch Hels, who has already finished his half of the bread. 

  “Can I make an observation?” he asks after a few minutes.

  Hels huffs. “No but you’re gonna do it anyway.”

  “You’re not used to the concept of sharing, are you?”

  “Sharing?” Hels sits up straighter, a possessive look appearing in his eyes. “I don’t share anything! Nothing!”

  “That’s not what I meant,” says Wels. “I meant the concept of people voluntarily sharing things with you.” 

  Hels glares at him for a moment longer, before relaxing visibly. “No. Back in my dimension, it’s every person for themselves. You protect what you’ve got cuz if you don’t, you’re gonna lose it forever, so people hoard their stuff like it’s made of gold. I never got attached to anything cuz I knew it’d probably get snatched away from me sooner or later. I-.” He breaks off as he registers Wels’s expression. “Oh, don’t you dare pity me,” he growls. 

  “I’m not.”

  “Yes you are, you’re looking at me like I’m an abandoned baby dog or something.”

  Wels raises an eyebrow. “Baby dog? You mean a puppy?”

  “Shut up!” Hels growls again and huffily turns away from his counterpart. “I’m not a stupid puppy for you to adopt and train! If I get the opportunity, I WILL kill you. I would gladly leave you here to rot if it meant I could get outta this stupid hole. In fact, the only reason I’m not beating you to death right now is because you’re my best chance of getting out of here alive.”

  A pause follows his words. 

  Eventually, Wels sighs. “Sometimes, it’s so easy to see that you’re all the worst parts of me combined.”

  To his surprise, Hels doesn’t respond. His arms are folded but Wels can’t see his expression, can’t see that his counterpart’s eyes are misted over. 

  Hels is frustrated with himself; Wels has insulted him many times since their first meeting so why did that one little remark hurt him so much? Why has it brought him to tears like this? 

  Maybe it’s because Wels’s remark forced him to remember that he’s not his own person. He wasn’t born organically; he was brought into existence by a combination of Wels and a weird cloning machine. The nature of his “birth” means he isn’t a real person. He’s just a copy of Wels, made up of all the parts of himself that he hates.  

  Maybe that’s all he’ll ever be.

  A soft groan brings Hels out of his thoughts. He glances to the right and sees that Wels’s condition has deteriorated; his skin has rapidly paled and he’s clearly struggling to breathe. 

  As Hels watches, Wels reaches a shaking hand into his inventory and weakly throws an item to Hels, who catches it and turns it over. It’s a flint and steel. 

  Hels glances up in time to see Wels drop some obsidian down beside him as well. “Go, Hels,” he rasps. “Make a portal and go back to the nether.”

  Hels blinks, his mind racing as he tries to figure out the catch. “What are you doing? Why did you give me this?”

  “So you can escape. My friends are coming for me but I’ll probably die before they get here. If you’re still here when they arrive, there’s no telling what they’ll do to you. Just go while you still can.”

  After a moment, Hels narrows his eyes. “Are you tricking me? What’s the catch?”

  “Nothing,” Wels insists weakly. “Just please, go, quickly.”

  “No, seriously. Why are you so insistent I leave?”

  “B-Because…” Wels hesitates, taking in a shaky breath. “Because it’s getting dark and the mobs will be coming soon and I don’t want you to die. If I die, I respawn. You don’t.”

  Hels stares at his counterpart in confusion. “You… don’t want me to die?”

  “Of course not. How many times do we have to-.”

  He breaks off as he tries to stifle a pained cry. The fall damage he took is starting to catch up with him now. 

  The groan of a zombie sounds from nearby. Hels’s eyes widen with fear.

  “Go, Hels!” Wels’s voice cracks. “Please!” 

  Looking deep into his counterpart’s eyes and finding nothing but fear and desperation in them, Hels turns and creates a portal on the very edge of the pit, lighting it up with the flint and steel. 

  He glances back at Wels one final time, before disappearing through the portal.

  Wels closes his eyes, breathing a shallow sigh. His counterpart should be safe; if he’s anything like Wels himself, he knows how to survive on his own. 

  As the mob sounds start to surround him, he feels a calm sense of relief. He knows he’ll respawn back in his bed, and at this moment, he doesn’t care that he’ll lose the items he has on him right now. He just wants the pain to end. 

…

  Hidden safely in the nether, Hels clutches the flint and steel his counterpart gave him. He can’t stop staring at it; it represents the sacrifice Wels made for him. The first time anyone has been willing to lay down their own life for him. He can hardly believe it even happened at all; the concept of loving someone enough to want to protect them even at the cost of their own life is completely foreign. 

  As he’s puzzling this out, a message appears on the communicator he stole from Wels during their last confrontation. A message he knew deep down was coming, but one that still catches him off guard. 

Welsknight was slain by zombie

[365days365movies]

May 1: The Prestige (2006) (Review)

Are you watching closely?

This movie...this movie. I like Christopher Nolan, and he specializes in these mind-bending sort of films. Haven’t seen Memento yet, but Inception and Interstellar definitely fit that bill WELL. And Nolan’s definitely good at it, with this film now added to that list.

Gotta say, I wish there were more movies like this. You know, about magicians in the past. Plus, I’d really love to see a movie with more scientific magicians. Like, inventors who use their scientific acumen to perform insane feats. Really lean into that Arthur C. Clarke angle, y’know? I think it’d be pretty cool, honestly.

Also, I haven’t seen The Greatest Showman, but I’m sure that Jackman gives off some similar vibes here. And before you say “YOU NEED TO SEE THEGREATESTSHOWMAAAAN”, I’m just gonna say: P.T Barnum does NOT deserve to have a musical made about him starring Hugh Jackman. Dude was an animal-abusing racist MONSTER, who did a LOT of fucked up shit in the pursuit of money. Dude rented a blind elderly black woman (while slavery was illegal in New York, mind you) and sold tickets to see her, claiming that she was the nurse of baby George Washington, and 161 years old. When she died of old age, he sold tickets to her fucking AUTOPSY! And that was the VERY BEGINNING of his career. FUCK P.T. BARNUM.

...Anyway. Let’s talk about The Prestige, huh? Review time! Check out Part One and Part Two of the Recap, if you’re interested!

Review

Cast and Acting: 9/10

Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Michael Caine, David Bowie, Andy Serkis, and Rebecca Hall. HOOOOO BABY! These six are the tanks of this movie, and they’re all excellent in their roles. I knew that Hugh Jackman had more acting range than he’s often given credit for, but this is the first time American audiences could see that range, and he’s fantastic with it. Bale is kind of Bale in some ways, but definitely disappears into the role of Borden pretty seamlessly. Which, again, is pretty much Christian Bale in general. I could say the same about Caine, but he REALLY disappeared into this role. Usually, I still see Michael Caine when I watch him, but this was all Cutter all the time here. Bowie as Tesla was surprisingly great, watching Andy Serkis’ Alley has fun, and Rebecca Hall’s tragic Sarah is basically the emotional core of the movie. But where’s Scarlett Johansson, you ask? Well, she was...OK. I really don’t think she was great in this movie, but it’s not like she was bad. Still, that’s where the missing point is; with her.

Plot and Writing: 9/10

I mean...come on. This plot is top notch. Based on the book written by Christopher Priest, and adapted for film by Jonathan and Christopher Nolan, this is a great story, and the twists are fantastic throughout. Genuinely didn’t expect the Borden twist...although I did figure out the Angier plot point pretty quickly, one the purpose of the machine was revealed. Yeah, soon as I figured that out, it was all over. I think the Nolans figured that that would happen, though. In any case, this is still a well-written film, full of references to the truth throughout. If you’re interested, watch this movie FIRST, then go on YouTube and find some video essays. You’ll see what I mean pretty quickly.

Directing and Cinematography: 8/10

I’ll be honest: I do like Christopher Nolan, but he’s never really struck me with a particular directorial style. The more notable part of his direction revolves around his film concepts than anything else. Now, that isn’t AT ALL to say that Nolan’s direction is bad. On the contrary: it’s quite good! But I’d also be lying if I said that the direction of The Prestige really stuck out to me. Much as I hate to take away any points here, this just wasn’t super-notable to me. Wally Pfister’s cinematography is also fantastic, but equally as notable. So, good grade here, but not perfect.

Production and Art Design: 9/10

Given the fact that this film is almost solely dependent on the idea of good-looking tricks and costumes, this is a VERY well-produced and designed film. Chronistically authentic and convincing, this is simply a goo looking movie. And the electrical effects are cool! There’s a lot to love here, is what I’m saying.

Music and Editing: 8/10

Music’s good, and definitely sets an eerie tone that fits the film. As I write these reviews, I listen to the soundtrack again to put me in the mood for the movie, and it works. This soundtrack is also VERY good at knowing when to use silence to emphasize something, as showcased especially well during the very end of the movie. As for the editing...OK, real talk? It’s good most of the time, but it’s also kinda choppy half of the time as well. I get that the plot is suppose to take you all over the place, but...sometimes I don’t know how necessary the edits are. Like, showing Borden reacting to the journal seemed unnecessary sometimes. A LOT of flashbacks, is what I’m saying.

Y’know...I think an 86% Is pretty good.

But I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I thought I’d like it...well, a little more. I mean, again, 86% is nothing to sneeze at, but it’s definitely lower than I expected. I think that, once the euphoria of the twists and the ending dies down, you’re still left with a great movie...but not a perfect one. And I think that’s still completely fine, because this movie is still a STELLAR film.

Do I recommend thisWATCHITNOW. Sorry, uh...yes. Yes, I recommend it whole-heartedly. It’s a fantastic goddamn movie, and you should see it at least once, for the experience. And trust me, when you watch it once, you’re gonna want to watch it twice. It’s that engaging, and it’s that good.

So, now what? That’s the first of the lo-fi sci-fi done, and it’s focused upon an interesting technological advancement: cloning. What’s another good advancement to look at? Well...why not something a little more unusual? Something not seen in the films very commonly. Something...something...uh...wait. What was I saying?

I’ve forgotten.

May 2: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), dir. Michel Gondry

[greenygreenland]

If I Were You: Fives x Reader

-for reasons that make it easier for me, this takes place in the US in 2020, so yeah, COVID is a thing -it’s been a while since I’ve written any Star Wars one-shots. I’ve been so busy working on Wannabe lol Summary: You and Fives dream about each other, but you’ve never actually met face to face. You are from a different reality than his where Star Wars is fictional. You believe he’s real, but only can prove it to yourself when he appears in your world. Fives learns about how stressful life off the battlefield can be.

WARNINGS: Mentions of violence, stressing over grades, punishment by parents (more like implied. I won’t write it out, so it’s vaguely stated.)

You sat on a crate, watching the flames lick at the air as Fives smiled to himself. You liked having dreams like this, where you both comfortably sat by the fire, chatting about your contrasting lives. You used to believe Star Wars was a fictional world, until you had dreams about Fives. He was always so real in your mind anyway, and this only made you want to believe in his existence more. 

“I have a big test tomorrow, but I don’t think I’m going to do so well.” you mumbled with a sigh. “It makes me feel bad that I’m struggling with this while you struggle with an actual issue.” Fives shook his head, shrugging a little as if it explained everything. “But I was bred for this, for war I mean. If I weren’t a soldier, I don’t know what I’d be.” He chuckled. “I can’t imagine myself sitting in a classroom all day learning about geometry and algebra. There are some boys who like that stuff in the 212th, but it seems like a waste to me.” 

You nodded in agreement. “Exactly. School is only good for producing data-rich kids who lack experience, especially when they start working and finding jobs.” 

“That’s how I felt when I was first deployed. No matter how much training you get, or how much you learn, experience is the best teacher. And like Rex always says--”

“--experience outranks everything.” you said in unison. Fives smiles, and he looks rather happy that you know that. But of course you do, in your world he’s only a fictional character. A person created by some movie producer or director or something (he didn’t remember). It gave him a mixed a feeling, a doubt of his very existence. Was he purely fictional? A fragment of someone���s own imagination? 

But then you told him something he swore to never forget: Just because it’s happening inside your head doesn’t mean it isn’t real. The world works in mysterious ways. Maybe we were meant to meet.

And so he hung onto that, always looking forward to when he fell asleep and talked to you. You always looked forward to your dreams too, allowing yourself to forget all of your responsibilities and problems. You never had anything to worry about around Fives, and having him by your side made you feel safe.

“I wish we could meet for real.” You didn’t mean to say that out loud and instinctively looked to meet Fives’s gaze. He nodded in agreement, resting his arms on his knees. “Me too, but if we do I’d rather you not see how horrific the Clone Wars has been.” 

“I wish the Clone Wars could have ended differently.” 

Fives looks uncertain of your answer, and he wonders if he should ask what the outcome of the War is. He wants to, but deep inside, he knows he shouldn’t.

---------------

You awake in your bed, rubbing at your eyes as your alarm goes off. You turn it off, glancing at the time groggily. 6:00. A sigh leaves your lips and you roll out of bed. There’s movement in your sheets. You freeze, taking note of how human-like the form was. “It’s too early for this sleep paralysis demons, stop--” you rip off the sheets as fast as you can, “--oh...” You trail off, eyes wide in bewilderment. There’s a familiar man in your bed, except, he isn’t a man at all. 

He looks to be around your age, and more youthful with the slightest hint of baby fat around his cheeks. He’s cleanly shaven, with a tattoo on his right temple of the aurebesh number 5. You stare at him for a moment, admiring how young, he looks. He's suddenly rolling in your bed, mumbling in his sleep before he jolts up, eyes wide and awake. He’s worried, maybe even a little scared at how unfamiliar the surroundings are. He’s already in ARC trooper mode, scanning his surroundings and reaching for his nonexistent blaster. 

“Where...” You met his gaze, swallowing hard as if it’d help ground you. 

“Fives.” Your voice is almost a whisper. “How did you get here?” You couldn’t believe your eyes. He was alive, in your bed, real. He shakes his head and sits up in your bed, eyeing his ‘civiie’ clothes uncomfortably. “Uh...these aren’t mine.” he dumbly states. You have the urge to snort. “Of course they aren’t yours Fives.” A long sigh escapes your lips and you eye the time on your phone. “I don’t have time to figure out how you got here. I have school and need to go in fifteen minutes.” 

“Out of all the days I somehow show up, it’s on a school day?” Fives remarks. You pick through your closet, frantically pulling out a pair of clothes and shutting yourself in so Fives doesn’t see. “I have a big test, it’s first block and I’ve gotta walk to school.” You pull on your shirt and trousers, emerging from the closet with a frown. “I can’t be late, but I can’t just leave you here.”

“Should I, I don’t know, go with you?” 

“You’re not enrolled in school,” you reach for a brush and Fives can only stare in awe as you run it through your locks. “I’m not sure what to--” You pause, placing your brush down with a sigh. “Oh right.” 

“What do you mean, ‘oh right?” 

“Global pandemic. I have online school. On the bright side, my parents are away. They’ve been quarantined in another state for work reasons.” Fives suddenly feels very dumb. He recalled you talking about ‘COVID-19 ‘ and how it’s a bit like the Blue Shadow Virus. “School doesn’t start until another two hours, so why is my alarm on for six o’clock?” You power on your phone, switching through the alarms and disabling the ones you don’t need with a shake of your head. Fives is mesmerized. He likes how thin the device is, and how it fits in your sweater pocket like a piece of flimsi. 

You crawl around him, cuddling into your bed as he simply watches. “You’re going back to sleep?” You nod, placing your phone on its charger and closing your eyes. “We’ll figure out how you got here soon enough, and it’s not like there’s anything better to do.” Fives stares at your bed uncertainly. Was it really okay? You were a girl, after all, and this was your room. You beckon him over, and that’s when he decides to lie down. 

Sleeping in a bed couldn’t hurt anyway. And besides, he’s known you for a long time (how long, he’s unsure). He can’t help but note how humongous your bed is compared to the ones in the barracks on the Resolute. It’s so soft, and he feels like he’s laying down on clouds. 

“I’m jealous. Your bed’s really big and comfy. The boys would kill to sleep on something like this.” You smile, throwing your thick blankets on top of Fives. He’s about to say something, but you’re already asleep. It appals him how fast you’d done so, and again, he’s just the tiniest bit jealous. But that soon goes away as he relaxes into the soft blankets, savouring the warmth and comfort they provided. 

He doesn’t dream, and neither do you. 

You wake up to the sound of your alarm blaring, and it takes you every single bit of strength left in your body to slide it off. “Urgh.” You flop down and Fives lazily turns to face you. He opens his eyes, blinking the sleep away with a yawn. “Your bed is amazing.” You grin, climbing out of bed as Fives cuddles into your sheets. “I know, right?”

You open your laptop and log into Google classroom. Zoom awaits you, and it’s the first thing you open along with your quiz work. You sigh, begrudgingly turning on your camera as it starts.

“Good morning everyone.” your teacher says with a smile. “How is everyone doing today?” It’s awkwardly silent for a few moments before someone quietly says ‘good’. You wait for someone else to respond, but it’s silent again. Fives glances over at your computer. He silently crawls out of bed, carefully folding your blankets and ducking out of the camera’s view. 

“I guess everyone’s still asleep.” your teacher says with a chuckle. “The Zoom is open if you have any questions on the quiz. I’m not going to keep you here, so if you’d like, you can leave and get to work. You have until the end of the period.” You nod and exit out of the Zoom. Opening up the quiz, you scan over its contents. Your face begins to twist as you read through the problems, your stomach churning with unbelievable doubt. 

You were going to fail even though you spent all night studying.

“What even is this?” You scroll through the doc with a scowl, eyeing the equations and problems as if it were the scum of the Earth (which it was). “I’m going to fail. Wonderful.” Despite that, you get to work anyway, scribbling random numbers on a scrap piece of paper. Fives takes a seat on the chair next to you, curiously watching you work through the problems. 

“I thought you didn’t know how to do that.” 

“I don’t, but I’m trying to see if I can find the answers on the multiple choice questions through trial and error. If I get it wrong, then consider this test flunked.” Fives takes one glance at the paper you’re writing on and immediately regrets it. The equations look like a foreign language to him, with numbers and letters he wasn’t even sure could be possible. “That’s definitely not something they teach us on Kamino.” he says. “And stars am I glad for that.” 

You frown, scribbling out an equation with a groan. “I hate this!” Fives wishes he could help, but he doesn’t know how. Math isn’t something he’s done besides the basics of addition and subtraction. He knew decimals too, and a little bit about fractions, but that was all. It wasn’t enough to help you figure out how to use the equation  x = x0 + v0t.

“I feel really bad for you.” he muttered. You snorted. “I feel bad for me too.”

Fifteen minutes pass. Then twenty. Thirty. Forty. Forty-five....

“Done.” You typed in the last number and submitted the doc, running a hand through your hair as you did so. “I hate this class, but it’s required. Who even needs to know all this stuff anyway?” Fives doesn’t know how to respond, so he watches as you stress over your test. He had his own experiences of tests, but they were for ARC training, or drills he had to remember to keep himself alive on the battlefield. 

Like you said, this stuff was useless if you didn’t need it. 

The next three class flew by incredibly slowly. Fives didn’t have anything to do, so he watched you go about your day like it were a documentary. In a way, he found it interesting how simple yet complex your life was. You had six hours of school (which used to be seven before the pandemic), one lunch break around noon, and the rest of the day to finish assignments or relax. 

He envied how leisurely it was compared to his own life. You had free time to roam around the house or the neighbourhood once you were done, and a whole fridge full of flavourful foods he’s never even had once. Although your life was still stressful, it was lived in the bliss of never knowing the horrors of war.

“Okay, it’s lunch time.” you broke in with a relieved sigh. “Let’s go downstairs.” You opened the door. In Fives’s eyes, your house was a complete dream. “Wow. You have a nice house.” You smiled, leading him down the stairs. “It’s better than a barracks, that’s what. In most peoples’ eyes, my house is normal. It’s not too shabby, but not something you’d find in the town over.” 

“What do you mean?”

“Rich town. They’re known for the private schools--which are schools that cost money to be enrolled in. I go to a public school, but there’s really not much difference in the curriculums so it doesn’t matter to me. Save money, live better, Walmart.” Fives didn’t ask what a ‘Walmart’ is. As soon as you paused in front of the kitchen, he knew his jaw had hit the floor. 

There was a smug look in your eyes as you pulled a box of cereal out of the cabinet. “How about we eat a little bit of everything?” You tossed him the cereal box and he read the title. “That way you can experience it all.” Fives stared at the cereal box with furrowed brows. “’Kix’?” 

“I know right? Same name as your Kix.” 

Fives wasn’t a big fan of the cereal, but the candy you gave him? Force was that amazing. 

You both sat at the kitchen table, candy and chocolate wrappers everywhere. You’d clean up later, what mattered now was spending time with Fives before you figured out a way to get him home. “Isn’t it, I don’t know, lonely here?” he inquired. You fiddled with a candy wrapper, mindlessly scanning over it s ingredients. “I’m not sure. My parents are always away so I don’t see them much. I don’t have many friends and I don’t text them. I don’t really think I can say I’m lonely because I don’t know how it would feel to be lonely when I’m used to it.” 

Fives mulled over your lengthy answer thoughtfully. He thought about all his brothers, both the alive and fallen. He couldn’t imagine ever being separated from them, especially since he was around them 24/7. “Well for me,” he began, “I think I’d be lonely in such a big house. You know that I grew up around brothers, guess it’s all I’ve ever known. I’m never alone. I have my brothers.” 

You felt an equal sense of connection between yourself and Fives. Both of you did come from different worlds, but you understood not understanding something because that was what you were used to. You couldn’t imagine ever having people around while Fives couldn’t imagine being on his own. Slowly, you gathered the candy wrappers, depositing them in the rubbish bin before glancing at the clock. “I have two more classes.” Your voice was quiet. “You can hang around here if you want, I’ll be upstairs.” 

Fives winced to himself when you disappeared. He had hit a sore spot. 

Three days later, 14:20, Friday

“Done, done, and done. Happy Friday to you and happy Friday to me.” you mumbled to yourself with a sigh. You thanked whatever was out there for no homework and shrank into your chair. There was a ‘ping!’ from your phone and you checked your email. 

First Period Quiz: Marked

You frowned, tapping on the email anyway. Suddenly, you froze, eyes wide over the score displayed on the screen. 

25/100%

You failed. Well, of course you failed! You didn’t know a single thing on the stupid quiz anyway. A long sigh escaped your lips and you tossed your phone on your bed. You rested your head in your hands, heaving out deep breaths to steady out the shock. There were footsteps outside your door, and you didn’t need to see a face to know who it was. 

“What happened?” 

“That test this morning? Yeah, I failed. I studied all night, but it was useless anyway.” Fives didn’t miss the tremble in your voice. After being around so many brothers with trauma, he could identify that tone of voice in a heartbeat. Over these past three days, he learned a lot about you, and he knew you’d done the same. He found out that school was more important than anything to you. He surmised it was because of the pressure your parents put on your shoulders rather than something you chose to dedicate your heart to. He also found out your favourite colour was (f/c) and that you liked to (activity) and (activity).

On the contrary, you only learned about Fives’s habits and a few new things he liked to do or eat. He knew it was because he was, well, a fictional character in your world, but that was something he refused to dwell on (it’d give him an existential crisis). 

He took a seat by your side, gently placing a hand on your shoulder. You sniffled, and it was then that Fives knew he had to do something--fast. 

Tests weren’t something he personally cried about, but he had seen a few shinies do it in the past. “Hey, hey...” His voice was soft, gentle, like a warm breeze. “It’s okay. Can’t you, I don’t know, do a make-up test?” You shook your head sullenly. “No. My teacher doesn’t allow it.” 

“Oh.” He paused, rubbing circles on your back. “Well it’s not the end of the world, right? There will probably be more opportunities that can raise your grade.” 

“But I already have a ninety in that class!” You held back a few tears and raised your head. You couldn’t let Fives see you cry over something so pathetic. “I’m going to have an eighty-nine, and I can’t afford to do that! My mum wants me to go to Harvard, my dad wants me to go to MIT... Those are all IV League schools, the top of the top, and I can’t get there if I can’t keep my grades up. I--I just--I wish--” 

There’s another wave of tears that build up in your eyes and you bury your head in your arms. You heave out a shaky sigh as Fives scoots closer to you in support. You appreciate his presence, but you’re not sure he can really do anything to help you. He’s a soldier after all, not a professor from a university. He’s build differently, made differently, trained differently while you’re you. A teenager. A nobody who tries her best but can’t succeed. 

“My parents are going to be so mad at me. They’re going to...they’ll...” You know they won’t be home for at least another month, but that realisation is enough for the tears to burst and for you to start loudly sobbing. That test was the last to be submitted for the term, so even if you did try to persuade your teacher to allow you to do test-corrections, she would say no. You were going to have to accept a big, fat B on your report card. 

Fives doesn’t know what to say, but he knows that if Echo were here, he’d know exactly what to do. But Fives wasn’t Echo. He wasn’t good with words of comfort or really anything off the battlefield. He didn’t know this type of pain like you did. And so he asks the only thing he really can: “Is there anything I can do to help you?” 

You just want a shoulder to lean on, someone to physically be there for you after having no one for so many years. So Fives holds you, and you’ve never felt safer in his arms. He rocks you back and forth, hums a little song you know to be in Mando’a. What really matters is that he’s there, and that he has your back. No matter how different you both were, it was clear that pain could take shape in various forms. Some on larger scales than others. 

Fives knew that if he was you, he’d feel the same pain too. 

PT 2

[mwolf0epsilon]

Silly prompt Idea for if you feel like it: BATIM but the monsters are chill to humans but are still unnerving; Sammy doesn't care about sacrificing people and is instead constantly trying to commit theophagy, Alice just covers the ruined half of her face with a mask instead of seeking perfection but sings songs about dismembering people anyway, the projectionist is tame and comes when you 'Pspspspspsps' at him but he also plays with corpses. etc.

Summary: Sometimes Joey liked to shake things up a bit to keep Henry on his toes, but this particular loop was probably the weirdest of them all...

---

[[MORE]]

Joey Drew was a creature of positively maddening habit. He'd demonstrated this since he was but a little child, eager to run from the church service and get grass stains on his Sunday best, ready to go on imaginary adventures with his one best friend in the whole wide world. Indeed, a day could not go by where Joey and Henry didn't play pretend in the latter's backyard.

Now as an old and bitter man in a wheelchair, the same still proved to be unfortunately true, although the setting was much different. He'd drag himself out of bed every day, completed his routine, then off he went to put his "toys" and supposed best friend through the same nightmare over and over again.

Surely doing the same old charade had to grow stale even for him, right? Well... That's why once in a blue moon, Joey tried to get a little... Creative.

Henry found that he hated those times more than being a prisoner to a never-ending loop, because the unpredictable nature of Joey's creativity was truly something out of his nightmares. Such was his dilemma now.

The first sign that all was not as it should be was the fact the pedestals that allowed the Ink Machine to be turned on, were already prepared and ready to go. Items placed in their rightful positions awaiting the flick of a switch. The second sign was the apprehensive behaviour of the demon, upon Henry triggering its first appearence in this loop. It didn't jump out at him, instead merely pulled itself out of the ink with something akin to frustration.

"You too uh?" Henry felt for the wretched creature, knowing that it was as unwilling a participant in this show as he was. He also knew that it disliked when Joey shook up the plot a bit because it often ended with it finding a more painful demise.

The Ink Demon said nothing in return, but motioned for him to go with it's uneven limbs. Different or not, the path was a linear one and Henry had to go about everything as if it were a normal run... Except it was anything but. The Music Department was proof enough of that.

He fell through the floor, had the usual visions, acquired a fire axe, and was ready to find the music director creeping about as usual. Instead, the old veteran came face to face with a religious service in full swing.

Searchers and Lost Ones, gurgling and reciting along to whatever "words of god" Sammy Lawrence was currently preaching, were sitting in makeshift booths.

Several alters set up for the Ink Demon were brimming with offerings of dolls, trinkets and cans of bacon soup. So many, many, cans of bacon soup. Brought in by the members in attendance.

Henry paused, completely taken by surprise by this... Arrangement. If anyone noticed his presence, no one seemed bothered about it. If anything, Sammy glanced once at him and merely continued his sermons, giving Henry ample time to accomplish his tasks in the music department.

As he collected the abandoned pressure valve (because Jack had apparently also gone to the "Sunday service"), Henry wondered if the mad maestro would just let him leave peacefully.

When no blow came from behind, he felt pretty satisfied with the outcome. Until he had to pass by the large gathering of ink people again, that is...

The sermons had apparently come to a close, and it was about the time church goers were to perform their theophagy ritual. Henry expected them to just eat the soup as their "body and blood of god", but of course why would any sane man think that these people who followed the ramblings of a mad Prophet, would do so much as dare a glance at an offering to their Lord?

No, Henry should have honestly known better, and he came to a complete stop as he watched the once-respectable composer push a cage full of live rats, and a bowl full of ink, into the center of the room.

"Feast now brothers and sisters, for one day this flesh will allow us to regain our own physical bodies. But let us not forget our Lord's blessings. May drinking his blood infuse us with the courage we need to commit to such ritualistic prayer."

Henry didn't stick around to watch the "feasting", but the shrill screeching of rats and wet crunching of bones followed him all the way to Buddy's safehouse, where the poor cartoon wolf looked just as disgusted and horrified as him. Fur standing on end just as Henry's own skin got goosebumps.

Thoroughly disturbed by what he'd witnessed, the old cartoonist knew to be on guard for whatever came next. While the Ink Demon seemed to just linger and let them pass, Alice Angel was still a supposed threat he needed to contend with. Joey didn't do much with her, as far as petty resentment towards Susie went, so he expected a struggle. He didn't expect a cabaret show.

There, in a room fixed up to look like a stage with Butcher Gang clones working as some sort of bar staff, stood the malicious lady herself, performing with a mask fashioned from an Alice Angel cutout's head.

The left side serving to hide her deformities, while she seductively swung her hips to the beat of a song that was certainly less cartoony and more sensual. A tango of some sort, or perhaps even jazz. Henry had a bit of a tin ear, so he couldn't really tell...

She was pretty content just singing and dancing, although her words were ones that put both he and Buddy on edge.

Sweet words that romanticized death and dismemberment, because nothing spelled angelic mercy like hearing about your innards getting torn out and used in ways he dare not speak of.

At least the whiskey was nice, likely pillaged from a couple of employees's offices.

Wherever Henry went, he found no real danger. This loop was just weird. Of course before moving onto Bendyhell to see what in God's name Joey might have done to subdue Bertrum, Alice did ask him to check up on Norman.

He'd at least hoped the Projectionist was behaving as intended... Except he wasn't. Of course he wasn't. Henry nearly backed off into the lift as soon as he realized the hulking beast was playing with the remains of its dead prey, and then nearly straight up pissed himself when that blazing light fell upon him and his lupine companion.

But then the large beast did something unexpected. It lumbered slowly towards them rather than rushing them, and then gently head-butted Henry's arm, purring like a big twisted cat of some kind.

Buddy shrugged at him when he looked over with a raised brow, before the old cartoonist sighed and gave the object-headed beast a few scratches on the "chin" and left it to its... Morbid activities. Playing with its mangled food like an actual cat...

Bendyhell in contrast, was quite pleasant. Abuzz with the cheers of Lost Ones having fun with the games and rides. Bertrum looked annoyed, but entertained his guests nonetheless. Henry Eve caught sight and waved at the dancing animatronic that ran about checking in on the Lost Ones that were having a blast. Hopefully none belonged to Sammy's church, lest poor Bertrum ended up dealing with upchucked rat remains... Best not think of that.

The encounter with Allison and Tom was postponed to the giant Ink Machine itself. They were in the Ink Demon's throne room, playing card games with it. The absolute look of boredom twisting its grin into a grimace.

"You know what, I don't even care enough to ask..." He threw up his hands in surrender and simply say down with them. "What are we playing?"

"Go fish. At the best of three, then you can end this nightmare..." Allison sighed.

"Amen to that..." He took the hand the Ink Demon shuffled for him, then joined in their game, allowing Buddy to sit down besides him to doodle away in his notebook.

If Joey was going to weird him out with his freaky jokes, at least Henry would get back at him by leaving him waiting in his stuffy old apartment.

[phandom-phriend]

Phic Phight 2020 - Unrequited Love

“Reveal fic--Danny, Valerie, Vlad, or Dani gets outed in the most inconvenient way.” | Prompt by @pesky-poltergeist

Word count: 2,181

A lot has happened since Fenton became Phantom.

It’s only been a year and so far the teen has fought countless ghosts, was cloned, has constant targets on his back from both ghosts and humans, lost his sleep schedule entirely, saved the world (a few times), found out that the only other half ghost that could possible help him adjust is kind of crazy and infatuated with his mom, became a town icon, ect..

Oh! And he died. So there’s that.

But recently, maybe the most horrific event to date had occurred. After a long battle with a ghost who-shall-not-be-named, he came home tired. Clumsy. A little out of his element. And may have...sort of...transformed back in front of his parents whom he didn’t even notice were in the kitchen with him.

Typical Danny luck if you ask him.

And since then things have been weird between them. Weirder than normal, at least. Neither one of them brought up the incident. Danny chalked it up to them not believing what they saw, or maybe thinking the illusion was a byproduct of handling so many chemicals in the lab for long periods of time. But they were quieter now. As if listening for his footsteps and breathing. And watching him more closely, closer than they ever paid attention to him before. They smiled, but their eyes. Their eyes held fear and apprehension. A dangerous combo for anyone with as great of an artillery as they had.

So Danny wasn’t exactly keen on the idea of bringing up the topic himself.

But when Jaz left for a study date with her friends on some random Friday evening, Danny had the unfortunate luck to be caught by his parents in the kitchen. Not literally! But they were set up with serious faces at the table just��� waiting for him. Like they used to do when he got in trouble at school but now the air felt darker. It wasn’t sufficateing, no. They were still his parents after all. Even with all their blasters and ghost-hating ideals Danny wasn’t scared of them. Something just felt off. A little uneasy.

He sat at the table across from them anyway.

“What’s up? You guys are usually in the lab around now. Got a new breakthrough?”

“Not quite, Danny.” Maddie began, voice even. “Your father and I have something to talk about with you.”

“Alright, shoot.” The teen noticed the way his mother's hand flinched from its spot on the table. He ignored it.

“In the kitchen, a few nights ago. Phantom came in.”

“Oh, uh, really? What did he say?”

Jack sighed. “Danny, he transformed. Into you.”

“Oh, well-”

“Are you an imposter? Answer honestly, and don’t think for a second I won’t know if you are lying.”

“Mom?!”

“She’s just a little spooked, son. We just want to know what’s going on.”

Danny froze. Did they know so little about him that they thought he was some...fake? Not knowing him apart from Phantom was one thing. But not telling him from himself…? He shook his head to clear those thoughts. He’s seen stranger things. And he has been impersonated before. There’s good reason to be wary, it’s fine. “No, mom. I’m not some fake. I’m Danny.” he spoke calmly.

She stood from the table, eyes blocked by the red of her goggles, expression flat. It’s always bothered Danny that no matter how she moves, her suit is always silent. How can such a material rubbing against each other as she walks, as she moves, stay so silent? Well, his parents were always on the odd side. Maybe it was nothing. It is probably nothing.

“How can we be so sure?” her voice is as flat as her lips. He can’t tell what she’s thinking. No, he doesn't want to know.

“Well, what are some questions only I would know the answers to?”

Jack took this opportunity to jump in. “What’s your least favorite holiday?”

“Christmas.”

“Who are your best friends?”

“Sam and Tucker.”

Maddie clicked her tongue. “These questions are too obvious Jack. What if the ghost was able to take his memories?”

“Then how am I supposed to prove anything to you?”

“What is something you know that we don’t?”

Well, that was a tough one. Danny knew a lot that they didn’t know. But most of it was centered around his ghost half or the ghost zone, and that felt like dangerous territory to tred in without his parents leading the conversation there. That leaves his school life, which is a mess. And his time that he spends with his friends. But that, unfortunately, is typically one of three things recently. Ghost fighting, the Nasty Burger, and other illegal activities as a result of ghost fighting. Not exactly the best idea, but he’s certainly had worse.

“Uh, well. I snuck into the lab yesterday and took one of your in-progress projectors and may have sort of broken it. But it’s okay! Tucker is helping me fix it!”

“What?! How didn’t I notice!” Jack yelled from where he still sat, shock clear in both his face and tone. Danny didn’t bother to tell him that a lot of things happened without his notice, although his mom seemed to have the same thought with the side-eye she gave her husband.

“Mabe because he was a ghost when he snuck in.” she supplied with snide.

Well, she wasn’t wrong.

“Then how am I supposed to have you believe me? No matter what I say, you’ll just throw that “he’s been replaced” or “he’s being possessed” nonsense back in my face. I just want to go to my room and take a nap. What do I have to do to make that happen sooner?”

“We could take blood samples.” Maddie nodded to herself as if that had all the answers. 

For the first time that night, Danny felt his blood run cold. That was a bad, bad idea. Not only would it look more suspicious for how his DNA has so drastically changed and morphed, but being down in the lab… it does things to him. Makes him paranoid, mostly. But sometimes, when certain gadgets are left about on their work benches, it hurts. Leaves him dazed. Has the air left his lungs so forcefully it feels as if it were stolen.

Confession time, it is. A horrible, very bad time. But he’s so tired. He just wants this to be over, for things to be okay again. He was going to tell them eventually anyway, he just wishes he never had to. But he still can’t bring himself to just blurt it out, so he’ll have to twist his parents into that direction.

Danny can’t help but wish for Jazz to be here with him.

“Well, there could be other possibilities for what you saw.” Danny shrugs, hiding the panic he feels about the tests she wishes to conduct. Divert, divert, divert.

“Annd what would that be?”

“Wellllll…. Dad! You have a theory, right? The one you told me about last week?”

Almost as if there was a buffer symbol where his brain should be, Jack froze, leaving the room in a stiff, still silence as the older man tried to recall whatever it was from a week ago. Right before Maddie could break it herself, Jack shot up with a grin. “That’s right! Ghost molding!”

“Ghost...molding? Jack, honey, what are you talking about?”

“There are ghosts that look a lot like things, right? That one that looks like a tornado, or that other one that looks like some cartoon mad scientist.”

“Yes, dear. What are you getting at?”

“What if some ghosts mold how they look based on things they have a strong connection to. Like a family member, what killed them, or something like that. That’s why some ghosts look similar to one thing or another but have their own traits.”

Maddie seemed to think for a moment before turning back to her son with an eyebrow raised. “I suppose it would explain why Danny and Phantom look so similar. But what connection does our son have to a ghost?”

Man, where does he even start? What connections doesn't he have?

“He could be related to us?” Jack asked, thoughtful.

“No, no one who knew us has died that young. Even if they took their looks after our Danny, they would still have an age to them.”

“Well, there’s no way Danny killed them!” Jack said thoughtfully.

Well, that was only half true. They were getting closer.

“Do you think he was… there? When he died? Or when he came back?”

Danny snapped his fingers with a smirk. Both proud that they got as close to the truth as they did. “Bingo!”

Instead of a smile, Maddie just glared at him, causing him to shrink in his seat. “Explain.”

“I was there when he… died. And when he came back.”

“That’s not possible. Ghosts take time to manifest. Even then it’s in the ghost zone before they make their way back.”

“True, true. Unless…”

“I’m not playing these games with...you.”

“Alright! Unless… they died in the Ghost Zone, right? Or, more likely, at the portal.”

“How is that even possible. We would have discovered a body in our lab.” Maddie sneered with distrust at her son's words. Before he could say anything, his father jumped in.

“What if there was no body?!” Jack jumped up, hands accidentally hitting the table and making the whole thing shake. “Danny!” But then his tone changed. Quieter, reserved. A tone that didn’t belong on the vibrant man. “What… happened to you?”

“Don’t be crazy, Jack! What are you even thinking?! Nothing happened to our son. If this isn’t him, then he’s somewhere else.”

“He’s right.” Danny cut in shyly, hating the new dynamic. This had to change, and he had to change it. “Something did… happen.”

“No…”

“It was the day the portal turned on, two years ago.”

“Danny…” there was a warning edge in her voice, but he pressed on. He was too far now. They needed to know.

“I went inside to check it out. I tripped on some wire…”

“Danny, stop.”

“And pressed the ON switch by accident. A strange place to put it, really.” Danny chuckled awkwardly, trying to lift the mood. It didn’t work. “The portal turned on when I was inside.”

“Danny!”

“It hurt, a lot. But only for a moment. When I woke up again, I was Phantom. Well, a ghost at the time. I didn’t really choose a name until later.”

Maddie pulled out her blaster and pointed it at him, armed and ready. Thankfully, Jack leapt from his seat as Danny did the same, although Jack took a hold of his wife's wrist and forced her to aim upwards. She didn’t pull the trigger, but Jack didn’t let go.

“Mom!”

“Don’t call me that!” she spat out through clenched teeth as my heart seemed to fall through the floor. This isn’t how it was supposed to go.

“I’m not a ghost!” he pleaded, although he began to back away from his parents in case things went more south. “I didn’t die, not fully!”

“Don’t lie! Don’t use my son's form to lie to me!”

“I have a pulse!” the teen cried out desperately, tears threatening to spill. “I need to eat, drink, sleep! I’m still human. I’m just different now, don’t you see that?”

“Maddie.” Jack sighed out.

“Don’t be fooled! Either our son is dead or this thing is an imposter, honey! You can’t seriously believe it!”

“I mean, -I” Danny felt his throat close up. Was being half-ghost so bad? Sure, he didn’t think this talk would go well. But a blaster?! Was it really so hard to believe he wasn’t the monster they were making him out to be?

Was she right?

Danny shook his head and stood straighter. “I’m only half dead if you want to get technical. Even then, I consider it more as having powers than being dead.” He could see she wanted to say something but cut her off anyway. “Is it so bad? I help people! I-I fought a king, saved the world! What will it take for me to please you?! For things to, to be okay again?”

To his surprise, she dropped the blaster from her grasp, Jack slowly letting her arm go and taking the blaster for himself. But he did not point it at Danny, instead he set it on a far counter. Now looking at him, Danny could see how… sad his usually vibrant eyes looked. What was he supposed to do now? What had he already done?

His mother slowly walked to him, lips pressed in a frown. Danny stood his ground even as she leaned over him and whispered, no amount of affection in her tone. Only a stone coldness he’s never had directed to him before. “You may not be fully dead, but you are not my son.”

Mind clouded and fuzzy, Danny ran from the mother he loved, but no longer loved him.

[thorne93]

Unforeseen Chasm (Part 38)

Prompt: Two sisters fall for men that are absolute enemies. The love they have could tear all of them apart, or it could bring them together.

Word Count:4262

Warnings: Language,shirtless Loki, self deprecation, teasing, Smut!!!! just kidding but there is some implied

song for this part:Better- Betty Who, Graveyard- Halsey

Note: This is by far the longest thing I’ve ever written (including my novels). It’s a collaboration with the amazing @mrs-dragneel-stark-solo​​. It started as a funny “What if…?” and it evolved and got huge. This took two years to write. We are both proud and happy and we hope you enjoy it. It follows from Thor 1 to Endgame in the MCU. Some of the timelines may be off in order to fit certain people, and some characters may show up earlier or in different ways than they have in the movie. But for the most part, it follows the MCU. It also has a bit of crossover with some other Marvel characters throughout the story.

Masterlist for Unforeseen Chasm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shannon had got you situated in her old room on her old floor with Lucky laying on the bed with you, keeping you company. You assured Shannon you were okay for the thirtieth time before she finally left. You tapped into her speaker system and played some good heartbreak songs while crying all night. Would things ever be right with you and Loki? Were things over between you two? Did he no longer trust you? Were you really turning into someone who could say what you said to him? 

You didn’t know, you didn’t have the answers. All you knew was you had heart wrenching songs, a sweet canine companion, and a pillow to cry into, and for now, that’s all you needed. 

The following morning, you woke up with puffy eyes but you wanted to try and see what Loki was up to. Did he care that you weren’t there? Did he even notice your absence? 

You ordered JARVIS to pull up the security feed to the cell and you watched it for thirty minutes. Loki hadn’t woken yet, which was a bit unusual, but you remained watching. Finally, he began stirring. It was odd, even though you were still upset, seeing him shirtless still sent a pool of heat to your core as he lied in black satin sheets.

When he came all the way to, he looked over and noticed you weren’t in the bed. He felt your spot on the bed and must’ve felt that it was cold. He glanced at the open bathroom door then and noticed you weren’t in there either. Quickly, he raced out to the common living area, clad in nothing but pajama bottoms. He checked the kitchen counter and stainless steel fridge for a note, when he failed to find one, he checked the glass coffee table, not finding one there either. Next, he ran into your office -- nothing. 

He stepped into back into the main area, the realization hitting him that you didn’t stay in the cell. With a slight flicker of his hand, a clone of himself appeared. 

“She’s left, that’s not shocking,” the clone mocked. 

“Shut up,” he ordered. 

“If you didn’t want me to talk, why did you conjure me?” the clone demanded. 

“Why isn’t she here?” he asked, ignoring the snarky replica.

“Because you keep pushing her away. Before, when she was imprisoned in here, because of you, I might add, she couldn’t get away. You pissed her off and she was forced to sleep here, to stay here. Now, she can leave whenever you decide to hurt her.”

“Hurt her? She’s working with that maniac that nearly killed me,” he argued with himself. 

“You mean the world renowned physicist that you set off? The one that was doing his job? He’s no different than Shannon, Stark, or the soldier… The only difference is, Banner has the power to beat you.” 

“She should’ve known this would hurt me… She did it on purpose.”

“Yes, because the first thing prisoners do when their released is ask for more security while they’re in the outside world,” the clone remarked with an eyeroll. “Face the facts. You’ve hurt her by acting like a fool, so she left.”

“I didn’t mean to react that way. I just… She’s going to forget about me. She’s going to go back to doing what she loves, she’ll be surrounded by all those heroes and one day, she’s going to wake up, look at me, and regret the moment she ever said yes to me…” 

“And you’re going to decide all of that for her? You’re just going to assume that she’s going to do that? After everything she’s done for you, and with you? You think spending some time with the heroes will suddenly make her hate you?” 

“Well no, but--”

“But what? If you’re so scared of losing her, you need to start acting like you want to keep her, rather than finding ways to figure out how she might leave you. But that didn’t occur to you, did it? Because you’re used to running, to trickery, to betrayal… You can’t fathom the thought that she could possibly love you unconditionally, for you.”

“How could she? She said it herself. I’m a monster,” Loki suddenly responded, a sad smile on his face as he played with the palm of his hand. His nervous habit. 

“Did she? Or was she simply pointing out your flawed prejudice against Dr. Banner? Seems to me you’re finding all these excuses not to realize it’s your fault she’s left. But that’s familiar, isn’t it? It’s Odin’s fault you had a melt down. It’s Thor’s fault you didn’t earn the crown. It’s Thanos’ fault your mother died alone. But who is really at the center of all of these problems?”

“I’ve accepted the fact that I’m the problem when it comes to my family,” Loki nearly growled at himself.

“Then you need to accept the fact that you’re the problem when it comes to you and Y/N, as well. Last I checked, she came back to you, back to a cell that marked her wrongful imprisonment, just to spend the night with you, just to show you that you weren’t alone, as she’s done time and time again…”

“Well what do I do? I can’t exactly call her,” he muttered. 

“You hope she decides to give you another chance,” the clone informed. “But then again, maybe if you lose her, you’ll finally realize you need to take responsibility for the pain you cause people…” 

With another flicker, the clone was gone and the door to your room was being opened as Shannon entered with a tray full of delicious smelling food.

“Good morning,” she greeted sweetly, putting the tray on the desk, glancing to the monitors. “Whatcha up to?” 

You went to look at her, but realized you were crying, so you wiped your face quickly with your sleeve. “Uh, just watching Loki…” you informed. 

She sat in the spare office chair and looked at you for a moment. “Another fight, hmm?” 

You didn’t tell her last night why you weren’t staying down there, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out why you weren’t sleeping with your boyfriend. 

Nodding, you ran the security footage back to when you got to the cell, letting her watch the scene in its entirety. 

“Oh, Y/N, I didn’t think he would take it like that. If you want, I can have it so that you work with me more than with him?” She walked over to you sitting down by your feet. “Is there anything you want to talk about, we haven’t had much of a girls talk in well forever.” She reached for your hand hoping to be of some sort of consolation. 

You shook your head. “No, no. I’m excited to work with Bruce. If Loki’s gonna get mad every time I go work with someone that he pissed off… well he’s going to be in for a rude awakening,” you said with a laugh. “We pissed of a lot of people here in New York. I want to do this. I want to work with Bruce. He’s just going to have to be okay with that.”

“Well yeah but if it’s uncomfortable I’d rather you tell me right away.” She moved to sit cross legged in front of you munching on mango. “Anyways let everything out Y/N/N, I’m sure there’s a lot you’d like to get out.” She patted your leg.

“Working with Bruce is fine. No offense, but he’s better at physics than you,” you teased with a wink. “I think I’ll like it. But… just… Loki and his temper. It’s awful. I mean, he gets so mad at the smallest things and twists my words. It’s infuriating. And I don’t know if it’s just being in prison, or if it’s the brainwashing. I barely knew him before we dove off that bridge, so I have nothing to compare it to. Thor told me that he never got mad, he got even. But it just seems like no matter what I do, it isn’t right. If I stay, he’s accusing me of deceiving him and lying to him about wanting to stay. If I leave, he sees it as a threat of me leaving and never coming back. There’s no winning…” You took a deep breath and looked at her. “Do you ever have problems like that with Tony? Where the problem just seems to go around and around and you can never fix it?” you asked as you grabbed an orange and started to peel it. 

“Kinda. It mostly revolves with him and the arc reactor, he just won’t stop messing with it. He took it out a few months ago and I had to shove it back into him or else he would have gone into a coma. We got into it because I told him to leave it alone and he threw it at me saying that it’s the same when I mess with my powers. I’ve been trying to see how I can get the empath powers out of me but still nothing. I’ve been running so many tests that my arm looks like I’m a junkie.” She lifts her sleeve to show you.

You leaned forward, taking her arm in your hand, staring at it. “Jesus, Shannon. Does he know?”

“He may have caught me taking some blood samples… I was trying to see if there was any of it laced in there. My blood feels like it boils when I get hooked on someone’s anger.” She popped a piece of fruit into her mouth.

You couldn’t help but slightly laugh, no humor there. “That’s how I feel when anyone mentions Loki negatively.” Your hands sparked purple. “That was Thanos’s doing. To keep me pissed off.. What an ingenious way to do that. To take the love I have for someone, and twist it into a weapon.” You shook your head at the cruelty of it. “I remember when I used to want to have powers like you,” you remembered, somewhat fondly. “I used to pray I could be cool, and have all these mutant abilities. I mean, your powers let you get to know Xavier and all of the X-Men…”

“Well yeah but it’s not like all the mutations I have are good… in the time you were gone I went on missions with the team and I robbed the bad guys of their powers and I still have them. I’ve just chosen not to use them, even though they tend to take control of me.” She looked back at you. “Your powers are all yours because your Asgardian, mine came about because of a flaw in my experiment.” 

“You’ll figure out how to get the bad ones out,” you assured. “If anyone can do it, it’s you… and maybe Charles,” you said with a laugh. “Maybe you should give him a call and see if he and Jean could maybe put you under and… I don’t know, perhaps extract the parts of you that take on the mutations. I’m not a molecular biologist, that isn’t my field, but I imagine it’s like finding a cancerous tumor. Find the thing that’s out of order in the DNA and fix it.”

“Yeah I think I will but for now there’s other things to worry about. Like planning this wedding, making sure you're okay and situated. Keeping Tony out of trouble.” She giggled, remembering something. “I have to tell you last year I caught him making blueprints for a female Iron Man suit. It’s a lot more form fitting than his from the looks of it. I think he’s trying to make it for me because I keep taking one of his, but the thing is I don’t want my own suit. I told him he doesn’t need to make it but he still did.”

You shook your head. “Men. They have trouble listening, don’t they? Why don’t you want a suit of your own? I think it would be kinda cute if you two flew around in matching suits. I mean, I upgraded my wardrobe when Loki and I got together,” you reminded, thinking back fondly to the black and green hooded robe you used to wear. 

“I mean yeah it would be cute but then that would also means having to take the role as Iron Woman if people were to see me in the suit. It’s challenge enough being a part of the Avengers but it's a whole other thing being a figure I’m not. You two look good together in those colors.” She was remembering the cloak from the time you’d had come back.

“Thanks. Loki could look good in a burlap sack,” you remarked with a faint laugh, reaching for a piece of toast. “What if you are Iron Woman, though? I’ve seen the way the Avengers practically adore you. Tony, Bruce, and Steve are all willing to bend over backwards for you. Nat and you are practically best friends. Would it really be that far of a stretch to say you could fulfill the role of being Iron Woman? You’re intelligent, gifted, talented, sweet…”

“Aww, Y/N/N, as much as I appreciate the compliment, that’s not who I want to be. It would feel like the Red Room all over again. As much as it would be cool to fight in the suit, I’d rather be in the lab or helping the team find the bad guys and put a stop to them. To tell you the truth I’ve never had to enter a fight… well besides the one we had but that’s been about it. All my missions have been me controlling the villain while the team does everything else. And yeah I get along with them but it’s not the same. I was just a regular person before Stark Industry before the Red Room.” She looked at Lucky seeing him eye a piece of toast. She stole a piece from you to give to her.

“I get that. You don’t want your identity to be on the battlefield. In Asgard that’s nearly all there was. To be revered as amazing, you had to be battle worthy. It’s why Thor was so beloved. Other than that, there were the farmers, the medicine people, and the scientists. So when I learned that if I wanted Odin to like me, I needed to train, I was scared. I mean, you know how skilled I am with weapons -- I suck!” You laughed. “And now I suddenly had to wield a sword and a shield and powers… Thankfully, I was trained by the best of the best. If you don’t want to do that, then don’t. I bet Tony was just building it to say, if and when you’re ready, it’s there.” 

“Yeah I guess you’re right, things have been different lately. Fury has been asking that I be brought on missions more often. But aside from that, tell me what was it like spending time with Loki when you were in Asgard. I never got to hear about you two going swimming,” she asked you, wanting to hear about it.

Immediately, your cheeks blazed. You slightly pushed her, laughing. “Of course you’d ask about that, perv!” you teased, eyeing her. She began laughing heartily. “Um… Let me see… God that was so long ago. Well I remember being really fucking nervous, are you kidding me? Loki was… god the most handsome man I’d ever seen, and the most well read, and he carried himself like… well, like royalty. Everything about him was intimidating as hell. But he seemed to be warming up to me at that point. He had already spent nearly every day training me in swordsmanship. I will say it was really weird seeing Loki in his battle attire every day which covers him from the neck down, to nothing but swimming shorts. Hell, it was weird for me to go from the swathy robes and gowns to a two piece bathing suit. I felt like melting into oblivion,” you stated, remembering that night. You were extremely nervous that night you would make a fool of yourself. “I thought that night was my one and only chance to kind of win him over, you know? Impress him with my knowledge and grace. You know, basically flirt, that one thing I can’t do. I mean, you remember my track record with guys...” 

Shannon couldn’t help but giggle at seeing how red you’d gotten, thinking about how she was the same way with Tony. “That’s adorable, Y/N, but I mean look at you, you’re with him. Yeah there are some tough times but damn I see the love you have for him is greater than anything else. I can see how happy he makes you.” She smiled sincerely at you.

You nodded slowly. “Yeah, he really does. I mean, every guy I ever dated before doesn’t even compare to him. Sure, he makes me crazy but…” You laughed slightly. “What about you? How does it feel to be engaged? To Tony Stark, no less. You’re gonna be married to him! That’s so wild!” 

Now it’s her turn to blush, she never really thought much about it. “It still feels like a dream some days, you know how much I’ve always liked him and then he asked me out and things have been great. There have been a few bad moments but I still can’t believe it. I always dreamed of getting married to him but now that it’s come true I have no idea what to feel.” She twisted the ring on her finger as she smiled at you.

You watched her in in awe, grinning at her, and thinking to yourself. “That must be an amazing feeling, I’m sure. To know that he wants to spend the rest of his life with you. That he thought about it for hours on end, searched for the perfect ring, waited for the perfect moment… He really does love you. I can tell… mainly because he’s constantly threatening me if I hurt you again,” you half-joked. Thoughts of marriage and wedding began dancing in your head, but you tried to push them down. 

“Well that's a thing we kind of clash on he still believes you could…well that doesn’t matter. I never would have guessed that he would want me to be in his life forever. But tell me what.. or more like why Loki? I mean out of all the Asgardians, why him? I mean yeah he’s charming and good looking what caught your eye?” She went to changing the subject trying to keep you happy. 

“Why Loki? Hmm… That’s… a good question. I guess… I saw a tortured soul. I saw someone who just wanted to be seen and loved for who he truly was. I saw myself in him, as he was adopted. I saw myself in him when I would catch him reading in the library at late hours. I watched how performing magic with his mom made him tremendously happy. He’s witty, and clever, in ways I’ve never seen in any one. And I don’t mean all the mean ways, like betrayal. For instance, a lot of people see him as a trickster, a prankster, right? Well, some might say he’s being childish, silly, or even mean. He once turned bread on a table into snakes at a royal dinner. All he did was smirk and sip his wine as a few of the women screamed and jumped back. But what I saw, was that Thor loves snakes and he took one and kept it as a pet for a few days before releasing it into the wild. Odin even smirked ever so slightly at the gag. While some people see his antics as mean, I could see they were the actions of a man who only wanted to make people around him laugh. He also used to do tricks for the local children. That’s why he resorts to humor and mockery in desperate situations. He uses the gifts he was taught. Thor had his looks, braun, and charm to go on. I could tell Loki had to work twice as hard with nearly everyone he encountered to get the same respect. So he resorted to the only ways he knew how.” You smiled for a moment, recalling all the wonderful times you had on Asgard with Loki, observing him, watching him. “His taste in poetry always left me stunned. He knew I loved art so he showed me around the art hall in Asgard and we both loved the same pieces… It was as if the fates designed it. Not to mention us almost growing up together… Can you imagine? God. What a weird life that would be.”

The entire time you spoke Shannon was so struck with how different the Loki you spoke of sounds compared to what she’d seen. Granted, it wasn’t a good part of him, but it did give light to a different side of him. “I wished I’d been there to see it all, it sounds to me like you two are a perfect match. To hear you tell me about the times on Asgard with him and how happy you sound makes it worthwhile.” At that point, Shannon had cleared the bed of breakfast and she was lying on the bed sideways. “If it's not too much to ask, can you tell me about what made you jump after him during his fight with Thor? I don’t want to overstep any boundaries.” 

You shook your head. “It’s no problem at all… I… um… Our time together on Asgard was precious. I can honestly say he and I grew almost as close in two months as you and I did in our ten years together. We spent nearly every waking moment together. If Loki wasn’t training me, we were reading, exploring the palace, he was taking me into the woods, we were riding horseback. He helped try and find all the knowledge about my birth parents he could… I mean, I’ve been in love before, you know that,” you said, gesturing at her as she nodded, recalling two men you had been pretty close with. “But Loki, the love I feel for him it completely swept me up. It’s that sort of dizzying, intoxicating love that you’d do anything for, you know? When I saw him fall into that abyss… Nothing else was on my mind but life without him, and suddenly that became unbearable, so I jumped. I didn’t think about Earth, Asgard, my parents, you, Lucky… Any of it. I knew that if Loki died, I would die with him. So I thought I might as well join him. I thought maybe somehow if I jumped with him, he wouldn’t be alone. He’d felt so alone all his life, I couldn’t imagine him dying alone too. I also somewhat hoped that he’d survive the fall, and I would be with him then too.” 

“I’ve never heard you talk like this, Y/N but I can understand what you mean. If it’d been me and Tony, I would have done the same, granted almost did when he’d been taken hostage and had his own weapons turned on him.” She seemed to go to a dark moment in the past, but fazed out of it. “I’m just glad to know you’re alive and you're here with me now. That’s all that matters now.” She hugged your leg to reassure herself. 

The rest of the day, the two of you spent chatting, positive things mainly, until you had to report for work and Shannon had a mountain of paperwork to get through for Tony and herself. When you were finished with your work, you decided to go see Loki, hoping he’d cooled down and thought about what he had said and done. 

The familiar whoosh of the doors alerted Loki of your presence, he watched as you walked inside the room. He wondered if you would join him in the cell. Without hesitation, you walked over to the cell doors and put your hand on the scanner, it granting you access. 

You knew that if you stood outside and talked to him, it would be this division between you two. It would symbolize how you felt like he was a prisoner and you were a civilian, free to live. Standing outside and talking to him would mean that you felt you belonged out there and he belonged in there, but you were here to show him there was no divide, there was no separation. You were his and you would follow him anywhere, be with him anywhere. 

“Loki,” you said, ready to duke out another fight but he simply stood from his place on the couch and held up a hand. 

“Y/N, I’m sorry, can you forgive me? I behaved like an idiot and I’m truly sorry.”

You stuttered nothing, incoherently for a second before you finally said, “Uh, yes, I forgive you. But wha--”

Before you could say anything else he was to you in a second, his mouth colliding with yours, his fingers tangling in your hair. “I vow to be the man you deserve,” he suddenly breathed in between kisses, barely giving you time to breathe before he suddenly picked you up and carried you to your bedroom, the fight utterly forgotten.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Tag List: @essie1876​ @magpiegirl80​ @letsgetfuckingsuperwholocked​ @iamwarrenspeace​ @marvel-imagines-yes-please​ @superwholocked527 @missinstantgratification​ @thejemersoninferno​ @rda1989​ @munlis​ @thefridgeismybestie​​ @bubblyanarocks3​​ @igiveupicantthinkofausername​​ @kaliforniacoastalteens​ @feelmyroarrrr​​ @kaelingoat​ @friendlyneighbourhoodweirdo​​ @damalseer​​ @heyitscam99​​ @yknott81​​ @sorryimacrapwriter​​ @glitterquadricorn​​ @xxqueenofisolationxx @little-dis-kaalista-pythonissama @bittersweetunicorm​​ @alyssaj23​​ @sea040561​​ @princess76179​​ @thisismysecrethappyplace​​ @sarahp879​​ @malfoysqueen14​​ @ellallheart​​ @breezy1415​​ @marvelmayo​​ @random-fluffy-pink-unicorn @cocosierra94 @hardcollectionworldtrash @capsmuscles @marvelloushamilton @paintballkid711​

Loki: @lostinspace33​​ @ultrarebelheart​​ @lenawiinchester​​ @esoltis280​​ @tngrayson​​ @wangdeasang​​ @harrymewmew @jayfantasyatyourservice​​

UC: @lokis-high-priestess​

@pandacookieowo​

[creacherkeeper]

am not bound 

spoilers for first few episodes of she ra season 5

catra cuts her hair. angst. 2k 

--

She hadn’t really slept. 

Catra didn’t know the last time she’d really slept. The time on the ship felt like a fever dream, like one waking nightmare that still clung to her in flashes of vision and the curl of whispers around her ears. It was true--sometimes she’d sit on the bed they’d given her, prop herself in the corner of the wall and stare--just stare at the door and wait for the green haze to envelope it, to confirm what every last person on that ship already knew: she was a prisoner. But the green haze never came; they let her roam the ship at her will. And yes, sometimes her eyes would slip closed and stay closed for a length of time she couldn’t really put a finger on. 

But she didn’t sleep. She didn’t rest. She went unconscious for just enough time that her heart would keep working, and that was it. She hadn’t gotten a good night’s sleep in … well. It was better not to think about. 

She didn’t remember sitting up in her bed. Not her bed. The bed--the one Adora and the others had given her. Even when they got back to Etheria, Catra knew that there wasn’t a single thing left that was really hers. 

Her hands shook. She dug her sharp nails into the fabric of the mattress, and then, when that wasn’t satisfying, moved to dig them in the back of her skull. 

Her hands froze. 

The feeling of shortly cropped hair on the back of her neck was a surprise. She’d felt it almost immediately upon waking. Her head felt lighter, more than she would’ve ever considered it could have. She didn’t realize how much her hair--long and wild as it’d gotten--was weighing her down. When she was … under his influence, she’d watched them cut it--not through her own eyes, but through all of them. That’s how it was. There wasn’t just Catra. She felt every footstep, heard every thought. 

Hive mind. It was a fitting term. Each and every life aboard the ship had swarmed her mind, and though now she was free, she was safe, it felt … quiet. 

Lonely. 

Her nails dug into her neck for just a moment longer. She let them lift and experimentally rub against her cropped hair. She didn’t remember the last time it had been cut. She’d always hated it. Something so sharp so close to her, and she just had to trust that whoever’s hand they were in wouldn’t mess up, wouldn’t hurt her. 

Shadow Weaver had only tried once. She’d gotten a bit hand for the effort. Catra had gotten worse in return. 

Her fingers curled through the short strands. 

She hadn’t cared when it was one of the clones cutting it. It was what he wanted, so she was happy to oblige. Her hair was too long. It was messy. Wild, just like her. He’d said it with disgust. This was one little way he could tame her. 

A strangled yell rose in Catra’s throat. She felt like, maybe, if she was loud enough, angry enough, she wouldn’t feel so afraid. 

God, she felt lonely. How sick was that? 

She rose from the bed and stumbled to the attached bathroom. The bathroom was shared between two rooms, so she quickly locked the door on the other side. She let her eyes rise to meet themselves in the mirror, only startling back a little when they were wide and far too wet. 

“Look at yourself,” she hissed. She twisted her head this way and that. She looked different. Unrecognizable, almost. Her greasy hair fell in locks around her face, limp against her forehead. Even to her own eyes, she looked exhausted. Her eyes were bleary, set atop dark bags. Her mouth seemed etched in a permanent frown. The dark hairs of her eyebrows were patchy where she’d pulled them out from nerves. And her hair. Shit, her hair. 

Her mind scattered and jumped. She saw herself, by Prime’s side. She saw herself, sitting obediently in the chair. She heard the sharp snip of the scissors in her ear. 

When she snapped back to place, her jaw was trembling. 

“Stop it.” Her hands gripped the edges of the sink. “Stop- Just--” 

She swiped away the tears on her cheeks, too embarrassed to even acknowledge them. 

The ship jumped suddenly, and the fur on Catra’s shoulders stood as she hissed in surprise. There wasn’t anyone to hiss at besides her own reflection. 

She jumped again at the loud clatter on the ground, tail puffing with nerves. She hadn’t even noticed the little box on the counter, so wrapped up in her own morbid spiral. 

She leaned down and picked up the box. She didn’t recognize the symbol on the front. First Ones something or another. 

The latch snapped open, and her fingers raised the lid. 

Oh. A medical kit. 

There were some bandages, but not many. It looked like some had been used. There was a vial of some sort of ointment, some sort of injector. There were also … 

Her fingers closed carefully around the handle of the scissors. 

They were small. Meant for cutting gauze and stitches, she mused. They wouldn’t be good for … 

She glanced back to the mirror. 

Her hands shook as she took the first greasy lock, pulled it taught, and with an electrifying snip, cut it in two. She stared at the hair between her fingers, then let it fall into the sink. 

It was fine. This wasn’t like … She wasn’t acting out, she wasn’t crazy, it was just … It’s not like any of this was real. It’s not like anything had been real for a long time. 

(It was too real, was the problem, though she wouldn’t dare to admit it. Everything felt too real, too much, too loud, too important, and, and ... It didn’t matter, nothing mattered, because she’d screwed it all up. Everything that had ever mattered, she’d lost, she’d chased it away. Her, away.  

She’d come back. 

But that wouldn’t last for long.) 

She cut another strand. 

It looked worse the more she went on, but that was … it was part of the point, because it was messy, like she was, it wasn’t good and nice and right, it … it was wild. It was just her. 

Her biggest mistake was that she hadn’t heard the sound of her own sobs, hadn’t even realized she’d started crying. She didn’t realize she’d yelled and smashed her fist against the glass until it had already started to ache. 

Because … it was messy, and that was the point, but it was also the problem--she was the problem, she always had been. And she couldn’t hide behind her hair anymore, behind the weight of her visor. It was just this--just her--her own open face staring back. 

She flinched as the door to the bedroom cracked open, and realized she hadn’t even bothered to close the bathroom door. Of course it was Adora who came stumbling in, ever eager, ever worried. 

“Catra--” Adora breathed, and Catra didn’t know why she fought. She fought as Adora tried to wrestle the scissors from her grip. 

Adora won. Of course she did. 

Her grip was weak, she thought. She hadn’t slept … 

“You could’ve hurt yourself,” Adora admonished, like they hadn’t spent the last however long beating the shit out of each other in a never-ending string of battles. She let the scissors clatter to the counter beside them. 

Catra didn’t say anything. She didn’t have anything to say. 

Adora blinked, as if finally seeing her. Her eyes swept between her newly cropped hair and her face. 

“You cut it,” she said, dumbly. 

Catra swallowed. Her eyes dropped. It felt stupid, now. She’d thought it some sort of reclamation, but … She wiped away the tears on her cheeks. 

“It looks …” Adora trailed off, and Catra found herself desperate to know where the sentence would’ve led. “I would’ve helped.” 

“Yeah, like I trust you and sharp objects.” 

Adora chuckled. Catra wondered if she’d meant it as a joke. 

“I can at least get the back. You, uh … really did a number on it.” 

Her hand shot up to feel the hair on the back of her head, cheeks heating in obvious betrayal. The hair was choppy and uneven beneath her fingers. 

“Do you--” Adora paused, hesitant. “-want me to?” 

There’d been a time when Adora wouldn’t have asked. For things like this, for things that meant something, they didn’t really use their words. They just knew. They always had. So there was a lot they never really said. 

(Words they never would say.) 

But they weren’t those people anymore. 

Catra swallowed. 

“I don’t need your help.” 

“I know,” Adora said. She sounded … sad. “I just … thought it might be easier.” 

Catra stared, wide eyed, and hated how painfully her heart was beating. Whatever this was, it was hard, in a way that things had never been hard between them before. 

“I’ll be careful,” Adora said. 

I won’t hurt you, she didn’t. 

Catra hoped the risen fur on her shoulders wasn’t too obvious. 

“Whatever,” she spat. 

She turned, watching Adora in the mirror. With trepidation, the other girl picked up the scissors. 

She couldn’t help but close her eyes when Adora’s fingers found their way to the hair on the back of her neck, straightening it out, finding where it was uneven. She crossed her arms, trying to contain the way they trembled. 

Adora probably wouldn’t notice. She never really noticed things like that. 

Her shoulders clenched as the scissors snipped behind her head. Part of it was the sound--she hated the metallic hiss. But part of it was … well, she imagined, anyway … domestic. And nothing that could match that descriptor had any place in a life like hers. 

“How short do you want it?” Adora asked, brushing away a little clump. Her fingers touched the metallic chip and quickly pulled back. 

“I don’t care,” Catra grumbled. 

There was silence. Grudgingly, she opened her eyes. 

Adora wasn’t looking at her. She was looking at the back of her neck, where that damned chip was embedded in her skin. Then, her eyes turned to the stray clumps of dark hair that littered the bathroom sink. 

“Obviously you do.”

Catra’s arms shook. She let her nails dig into her skin. 

“Short.” 

Dutifully, Adora went to clipping. Regardless of her intent, it probably wasn’t going to look good. She didn’t think Adora had ever done this before. That was fine. It didn’t have to look good, she just didn’t want … 

She didn’t want him to have touched it. 

“I’m gonna get behind your ears,” Adora told her, waiting a few moments before moving. Catra was glad for the warning. She screwed her eyes shut as the metallic snip got louder. 

“Okay,” Adora said after a few minutes. “I think that’s it.” 

The scissors met the counter. Catra blinked her eyes back open. 

She didn’t look at herself first, just at Adora, who was watching her in the mirror. She should probably thank her for the help, but her tongue was stuck fast within her mouth. 

After a moment, she turned her gaze away. She twisted her head and stared at the newly shorn cut. 

She swallowed. She felt nauseous. 

“It’s fine,” she said dryly. 

Adora turned her gaze away. “Do you need anything else?” 

I can’t sleep, Catra wanted to say. I haven’t been able to sleep in so long. 

“No.” 

Adora nodded, chewing on her lip. 

“I’ll, um. I’ll let you rest, then.” 

She turned and left the bathroom, and Catra wanted so badly to reach out and catch her arm, but didn’t. She stared at the spot Adora had emptied, shoulders shaking, hands curling to let her claws dig into her flesh. 

“Stay,” she whispered, a broken plea, into the silence. 

And only silence met her ears. 

Her hand rose, palm scuffing through her short hair. The texture was completely foreign. It didn’t feel real. None of it felt real, but it was too real, all of it made so by the mess of cut hair and the tears on her cheeks. 

She gripped the short strands and tugged. Her hand dropped. 

She sunk to the floor, out of sight of the mirror. Her arms wrapped around herself, tail curling around her legs. It was stupid, the stupidest thing in the world--the universe--to be upset about her hair. So much had happened. So much that would haunt her when she tried to close her eyes. 

But now all of it came flooding back each time she looked in the mirror. 

She let her forehead drop to her knees. 

"Stay."

[steebharringt0n]

snapshots of our lives | b.h x you

Sent away for a work conference, Billy finds himself snowed in at JFK Airport. Itching to be back home for Ava’s first Christmas he meets a mysterious stranger at the bar who might be just be able to solve his Christmas dilemma.

a/n: IT’S OFFICIALLY THE HOLIDAY SEASON AND I CANNOT CONTAIN MYSELF. this story gave me cavities, I’m not even joking, this is by far the fluffiest thing I’ve EVER written. (part 2 of shadows of the night will be posted later today ayy two stories in one day!)

---

You pressed your head against the kitchen wall, twisting the phone cord around your finger. In the background you could hear Christmas music playing, Adam trying his best to help Ava decorate her Christmas cookies but she was more enthralled by all the colorful icing and sprinkles around her.

“No Ava, the sprinkles are for his hat!” you heard him pout. You could only imagine the only helping she was doing was shoving the sprinkles in her mouth.

You twisted your head around, frowning at your oldest child. “Adam, she’s only 8 months old, I don’t think you’re going to get too far with her”

You turned your head back around, trying to keep the conversation quiet.

“No luck huh?”

The other voice on the line sighed heavily, you could only imagine him rubbing his temples in frustration, “I’m sorry baby, I really am, I’m trying everything. This goddamn snowstorm came out of nowhere”

You glanced back at your children, both of them blissfully unaware that their father may not make it home in time for Christmas. You shakily exhaled, trying hard not to cry - you knew it would make it harder on him if you did.

Billy had been sent away to New York for a week for a work conference. He was due to be back on the 24th but New York got pounded by freak snow storm that stopped all flights back to California. So there he was, waiting around at JFK Airport, trying to kill time. His flight was already cancelled and he refused to pay for a hotel. He had some semblance of hope that maybe it would stop snowing and that he’d be able to see his kids and wife, but all of that went out the door when they predicted another foot of snow.

Worst of all, it was Ava’s first Christmas and he hated that he was going to miss her little [Y/E/C] eyes light up at all the toys Santa had bought her. He had already missed Adam’s Christmas recital, which fortunately for him you were able to catch it all on tape. But it still didn’t change the fact that he was thousands miles away from his family.

“I know Billy, it’s okay. I’ll tape everything - “

“It’s not the same Y/N ... I just want to be home, god, fuck this” he angrily muttered. He kicked the bottom pole of the payphone, his hands tightly gripping the phone in his hand.

“I know, I know. We just have to stay positive for the kids, for us. You’ll get home when you’ll get home okay?”

He let out another deep sigh. He felt so useless. “Yeah, I know, you’re right.” he paused, closing his eyes, trying his best to not let his anger get the best of him.

“I love you” 

His body instantly relaxed at the sound of those three words. If there was anyone that could get him to calm down, it was you.

“I love you too”

A loud commotion and Ava’s ear-shattering wail suddenly broke your thoughts away from Billy. You looked behind you and saw sprinkles scattered everywhere,

“Ava noo!” Adam whined, hoping off the chair and picking up the now half empty sprinkles container.

“Is that our children causing havoc?” Billy questioned, a slight smile on his face.

“Ah yes, your daughter has a knack for knocking things over - Adam, no, Adam, leave it there, I’ll clean it up - leave your sister in her high chair - no, don’t touch it! Ah, okay, Billy hold on just a sec - “

You placed the phone on the kitchen counter, quickly walking over to the dining room table where Ava had her little hands thrown in the air, her mouth open as she let out piercing screams. Adam took the opportunity to run over to the kitchen, grabbing the phone and pressing it to his ear.

“Dad! When’re coming home?” he excitedly questioned, “I made a drawing at school for Santa. You, momma and Ava are in it, Mrs. Lori said it was the best picture she’d ever seen!” he happily babbled onto the phone.

His mouth spread into a grin as he heard his son’s voice, nothing in the world made him happier than his children. 

“I sent the drawing to Santa in the North Pole, I told him that you went away for work and that you’d be coming back soon, right daddy? You’re coming home soon right?”

Billy’s smile dropped, he shuffled his feet nervously, uncertain on how he was going to tell his son that he probably wasn’t going to make it in time for Christmas. “Hey bud, I bet Santa’s going to love your picture, and I uh, I’m working on make it home okay? I’m going to try my very, very, very best to be home soon okay? You be good for momma, don’t forget to brush your teeth tonight”

“I promise I’ll be good for momma. Ava spilled all the Christmas sprinkles, we’re making cookies for Santa. We’re also making your favorite, the ones with the peanut butter” Adam said.

Billy swallowed thickly, trying hard not to let tears build up, “I can’t wait to try them buddy. Is your momma still busy?”

Adam looked behind him - in the last minute you had managed to clean up the mess and soothe Ava who was now happily resting on your lap, a teething ring in her mouth.

“No I don’t think so - “ Adam paused, “Momma! Are you busy?”

You let out a laugh as you walked back into the kitchen, “Say goodnight to your father, you’ll see him soon okay?”

Adam pressed the phone back onto his ear, “I love you daddy, I’ll see you soon”

Billy’s heart lurched, he had never hated snow more than this moment. “I love you too Adam. I’ll see you soon”

Adam then promptly handed the phone back to you, walking back to the dining room table to finish up his Christmas cookies. You carefully balanced the phone on your ear as one of Ava’s hand tugged on your hair.

“Hey, I’m sorry to cut this short, I gotta get them to bed soon” you wistfully told him.

Billy nodded over the other line, he twisted his other wrist to check the time. There was a three hour difference, it was almost 12 AM in New York, but almost 9 PM in California. You had let Adam stay up an hour earlier than usual since tomorrow was Christmas day, but you warned him that if he stayed up past 9 that Santa wouldn’t come because Santa only visits kids who are asleep.

“No, no I understand, I’ll uh, keep you updated if anything changes”

“Okay, I love you Billy”

“Love you too Y/N”

Billy slammed the phone back into the receiver, hanging his head low. He brushed a hand through his hair, walking back towards the gate where his plane was originally supposed to leave. He stared out at the large windows where a blanket of snow covered the runway. He then glanced up the TV monitor right above him, the word CANCELLED flashed brightly in red - as if it were mocking him.

He shook his head, making his way towards the bar that was still luckily open this late. He took a seat on one of the stools, raising his hand to get the attention of the bartender who was cleaning shot glasses. He then asked for some whisky, on the rocks. Alcohol always had a way to help soothe his emotional wounds, and right now he was hurting - bad.

“Alone on Christmas Eve? That doesn’t seem right” said a voice right next to him.

Billy glanced over, a large man with white hair and a white beard sat a couple of stools down. He too had a beer in his hand.

Billy shrugged, swirling around the drink, “My flight got cancelled. My family is in California, it’s my daughter’s first Christmas and I’m going to miss it” his voice was undeniably sad as he took a sip.

The large man nodded at him, “I understand. It’s hard to be away from your family during the holiday season”

Billy let out a dry laugh, “I hate being away from them at all. I uh, never really had the best Christmas’s growing up, but my wife, she’s absolutely amazing, she makes all these Christmas decorations, and my kids, oh man ... “ Billy paused, trying to keep his emotions at bay, his thumb twists his wedding band, “It just sucks you know?”

The man raises his hands, “No, no I totally get it” he then decides to scoot down towards Billy, taking the stool right next to him.

“Name’s Kris by the way” he extends his hand.

Billy glances up at him, he looks oddly familiar, but he takes his hand anyway and gives it a shake, “Billy, or Bill, whatever floats your boat”

“So uh, Billy, tell me more about your family. I’m sure it helps talking about them” Kris said.

Billy takes a large gulp of the whisky before he continues to talk, “I met my wife in high school, she was a quiet little thing. I was a little punk, don’t know how she put up with me, but I’ll forever love her for doing so” he smiles as memories of the two of you back in Hawkins flood his head.

“We had my son about 5 years ago, Adam’s his name, he’s a little clone of me, he’s so incredibly smart and so kind, and Ava is my little one, just 8 months old. She looks everything like my wife, she has the cutest toothless smile that just brightens up anyone’s day” Billy is grinning at this point, his hand continues to swirl the alcohol in the glass. 

“I had a really bad childhood growing up ... I had given up on people, I wasn’t a very nice person. But my wife gave me this amazing family, something I never thought I was able to have. She changed my life, my family changed my life” there’s a pregnant pause, “I’d give anything to be with them right now”

He downs the rest of the whisky, trying hard to not let his emotions overtake him. He then turns to Kris, who was just smiling and nodding at him the whole time. Billy gives him a thin smile, “What about you? Do you have a family?”

Kris takes a sip of his beer, shaking his head, “Ah, my family is far away as well, but I’ll see them by the end of tonight. I’m just taking a pit stop”

Billy frowns, “A pit stop? Where you heading to?”

“Ah, so many places”

Billy lets out a snort, “Good luck, you’ll need a Christmas miracle to get out of here”

Kris gives Billy a sly smile, he then signals over to the large window that looked towards the airport runway. “Huh, looks like it stopped snowing ... “

Billy glances behind him and his eyes widen, he places his empty glass down and runs over to the window. There were already workers outside cleaning up the runway. A sudden loud voice comes through the speaker, 

“Flight 342 to San Diego International Airport is now on a 3 hour delay. Looks like the snow has stopped for the rest of the night. Please allow our workers to clean the runway. Thank you for your patience”

A wide grin takes over Billy, his heart leaps with joy. He heads back to the bar to pay for his drink and to continue talking to Kris - but he’s nowhere to be found. 

Instead he sees a picture sitting on his stool. With shaking fingers he picks it up. It’s a stick drawing of a family, a man with blonde hair, a woman with [Y/H/C] hair, a little boy and a little baby. His name, your name and Adam and Ava are written right above the stick figures. He flips the picture over, the name Adam Hargrove is written at the top. His eyes prick with tears as he reads the messily written letter, 

Dear Santa, 

Please bring my daddy home for Christmas. I miss him very much. I have been a good boy, I eat all my vegetables and brush my teeth every night.

Love Adam Hargrove

A sob escapes Billy’s lips as tears hit the picture. He looks around for Kris, but he’s nowhere to be found. His mind can’t wrap around the fact at what just happened, hell, it doesn’t make a lick of sense to him. He wipes his tears, taking a deep breath to recompose himself. He calls over the bartender,

“Hey! Did you happen to see a large man with white beard and white hair sitting here?”

The bartender shrugs, “No sir, it’s just been you this whole time”

Billy shakes his head, “There’s no way ... it can’t be ... “ he mutters to himself. He glances back down at Adam’s drawing, folding it up neatly and placing it in his coat pocket. He pulls out his wallet and puts down a 10 dollar bill. He tells the bartender to keep the change.

He walks over back to his gate, taking a seat. His mind still can’t believe what has just happened, and he still can’t believe that he’s actually heading home. He decides not to call you and tell you the good news, he wants to surprise the 3 of you.

As soon as he lands back down in San Diego, he hails down the first cab he sees. 

It’s almost 8 AM when he finally arrives home. He promptly grabs his luggage from the trunk of the cab and walks up to his porch. He’s so excited he almost can’t contain himself. Grabbing the keys from his pocket, he unlocks his front door, opening it ever so carefully so that he can creep inside.

Instantly he’s hit with the smell of the peanut butter cookies Adam promised him. Christmas music is quietly playing in the background, he walks towards the living room where the tree is. He can hear chattering voices as he gets closer. He pokes his head in, a hundred watt smile on his face.

You and Adam have your back towards him, rummaging around through the presents under the tree. But Ava, all dressed up in her Christmas onesie, immediately notices her father. She babbles happily, clapping her hands as she reaches towards him,

“Da ... da!” she exclaims, her eyes wide and bright.

You turn your attention towards her, still not noticing Billy’s presence, “Ava, did you just say Dada?”

She reaches up for him again, and this time you finally look behind you and you let out a loud gasp.

“Oh my god! Billy!”

You jump up from the floor, throwing yourself into his arms. He welcomes your embrace, holding you tightly. You plant kisses all over his face as Adam leaps for joy, running towards his father and hugging his leg.

“Dad! Dad! You’re home!”

Billy has one arm tightly holding you, while the other is placed behind Adam’s head. You pull away from him, staring at him incredulously. Your mind still can’t process the fact that he actually made it in time for Christmas.

“I - I heard it was supposed to snow like crazy! What happened?!”

Billy shrugs, “I don’t know! It just stopped snowing! The craziest thing happened, you’ll never believe it” 

You and Adam watch as Billy pulls out a piece of paper from his coat, he unravels it and holds it out towards the both of you. Your eyes widen, then your jaw proceeds to drop.

“Hey! That’s my drawing!” Adam exclaims.

Billy crouches down to Adam’s height, “I know bud, I think Santa gave it to me”

Adam’s blue eyes become wide, a small gasp escapes his mouth, “You met Santa?” he whispers like it’s a secret.

“I did, he helped me get home” 

You pick up Ava who had been fussing the whole time to be picked up by her father. You hand her over to Billy, who then proceeds to give him sloppy kisses all over his face. She babbles excitedly at him, her little hands resting on his cheek.

Tears prick at your eyes, your heart swells at the sight of your husband and children. The rest of the day is spent opening presents, eating Christmas cookies and watching Christmas movies. Billy later explained to you about the mysterious man he met at the airport bar, still to this day you can’t believe how he was able to make it back home.

The both of you chalked it up as a Christmas miracle, and Christmas season at the Hargrove household became that more special to the four of you.

[spell-cleaver]

Prompt 4 with kid Luke and Hondo with a dash of Vader towards the end

This got longer than I expected and I think it’s still too short to do the narrative justice, but I hope you like it anyway :)

Han had been sitting listening to this Weequay's tall tales for an hour now, waiting for Chewie. He was getting bored.

"—and then, when I was much younger and sprightlier—but still very skilled and experienced, you understand, very good at my job—I encountered this young girl, Togruta—"

"I ain't interested in your exploits," Han cut in, because the rest of this had been awful but that was crossing a line.

"Oh, no, nothing like that, my friend! Not my type at all. Besides, if anything had happened, she would have shoved a lightsaber right through my head, and that would ruin this pretty face now, wouldn't it?"

Han rolled his eyes—then froze. Lightsaber...

"I've, uh," he said, rising from his seat in the booth despite the fact that the bar was still sans Chewie, "gotta go now."

"Oh no, stay, my friend! I have one more story for you before I have to go on to more adventures! It is about," he paused for dramatic effect and Han, despite himself sat back down and leaned in, "Lord Vader and a little boy."

Han was intrigued. He would later regret being intrigued.

.

Luke clutched Old Ben's hand tightly and tried not to cry.

He didn't succeed.

He cried—hard, big fat droplets rolling down his cheeks to splatter onto the floor of this cantina Ben had brought him into. Ben had dragged him to Mos Eisley, away from the burnt out homestead and his aunt and uncle's— their b—

He was here, and Ben hadn't wanted to take him in there despite the fact that Luke was a big boy now, he could handle anything.

But, even he had to admit, the atmosphere in this place was... scary. There were tall men everywhere, it smelled funny, and something felt... off, like he knew when a sandstorm was coming or that a vaporator was beyond fixing. He wanted to go outside, no matter what Ben had said about not wanting to risk that someone took him.

(Luke knew what that meant, even as young as he was. Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru's terror had never been hidden from him, and he knew about his grandmother.)

But finally Ben stopped talking to that human who at the... bar? He turned around, took Luke's hand and firmly marched them to the booth where that man had gestured, giving Luke a weak smile as he did. He looked distracted.

He'd made Luke sit with his back to the rest of the cantina, which Luke resented—scary or not, there were more species in here than he'd seen in his entire life!—but it meant that he got to watch Ben closely. He'd never spoken to him much, Uncle Owen'd hated him, but he'd been the one who'd shown up when he was hiding in the little secret trapdoor in the garage and he said he'd known Luke's father...

He was watching him closely. He saw the moment his face fell, his eyes bulged, and his lips moved silently.

Curious, Luke twisted round to see who had upset him, and saw a big tall alien—a Weequay? He'd only ever seen one picture of them, he wasn't sure—sashaying towards them, arms spread wide and braids swinging. Luke found himself grinning just at the sight of him; he looked like fun.

"Kenobi!" he called out, and he was delighted to see Ben, Luke could tell. Luke grinned wider—he must be a friend. "You are alive! I knew it, I knew it—you know, I tell people about my Jedi friend and they oh no, he's dead! You'll never see him again! But I knew it, no droid or clone or Imperial would ever take down the great Obi-Wan—"

"Shhh," Ben hissed, paler than Luke's clothes. "Yes, I'm alive. If you keep running your mouth like that, I won't be for much longer!"

The Weequay laughed a lot, though Luke was pretty sure Ben wasn't joking.

"That's my good friend Obi-Wan, always so modest," he said. "And no worries, before you ask—I will not sell you out to any of those nasty Imperials on this sleepy outpost. We are friends, are we not? And it's not wise to upset a Jedi," he shook his head sadly, "it's not good business."

Then he perked up again. "Now! It's been lovely seeing you, but I have a fine gentleman somewhere over here looking for passage to Alderaan!" His eyes scanned the surrounding booths. "Who do you think it is, that distinguished-looking man over there?"

Luke frowned. Glanced at Ben. He was staring at the Weequay and had somehow paled even further.

"Ben?" Luke prompted, finding his voice for the first time. The Weequay's gaze snapped to him and Luke felt his massive curiosity. "Didn't you say— are—" He swallowed at Ben's warning gaze but considered doggedly, "aren't we going to Alderaan?"

The Weequay froze, staring at Ben with his eyes comically large.

"Why, Kenobi," he said, "don't tell me you're the person looking to visit the planet of beauty?"

Obi-Wan said something. Luke was pretty sure it was a swear word.

.

The Weequay's name was Hondo, and he was awesome.

He let Luke play in the turrets—"Just shoot at a random point in space won't you, my boy, it'll all come in useful one day, eh?"—despite Ben's objections; he let him help with the jump to hyperspace—"I'll show you which buttons to press and you press them!—despite Ben's objections; and, most importantly of all, he told Luke stories about his father.

Also despite Ben's objections, but they were half-hearted at most. From the moment Luke's father had been brought up, he'd known he'd lost that battle.

"Your father? Oh, I knew him, little one, we were almost as close as me and Kenobi here were! Excellent pilot, excellent—"

"I thought he was a navigator on a spice freighter," Luke pointed out. Hondo was clearly in that sort of business himself; shouldn't he know the difference? Uncle Owen had made it painstakingly clear.

Ben winced. Hondo was surprised.

"At least, that's what Uncle Owen told me... But," he crowed, "if he was a pilot as well, then that's even cooler!"

He did not hear the small whimper of despair Obi-Wan gave when he called working on a spice freighter cool.

Hondo's eyes were wide. "Oh. Oh my. You didn't know? He didn't know?" He addressed the last part to Ben, who shook his head grimly—and a little pointedly. "Oh dear. My sincerest apologies."

"What don't I know?" Luke added dubiously, "That he was a pilot...?"

Ben sighed.

"Luke," he said gently, "come into the back room. We need to talk."

.

"My father was a Jedi?" he asked Hondo the moment he came back out. Hondo grinned and patted him on the head.

"Yes he was! One of the greatest Jedi ever to live, in my humble opinion. Second only to our beloved Kenobi, of course."

In the background, Ben sighed. "Don't fill his head with ridiculous ideas, Hondo."

"I would never dream of it, my friend! Are you going to train him to be a Jedi too?" He poked Luke's arm lightly.

Luke looked up at Ben and did his best innocent, hardworking and humble expression.

"...yes," Ben ground out, though he managed to make himself smile at Luke. "I will. If he wants—"

"I do!"

"Then yes," he smiled wider and patted him on the shoulder, "I will."

There was a beeping from the cockpit and Hondo jumped into action. "Looks like we are coming up on our destination, my friends!"

"Good," Ben breathed a sigh of relief and ushered Luke into the cockpit behind Hondo. "Once we reach Alderaan, I will get you your payment, Hondo, and then, Luke, there's someone I'd like you to meet—"

The streaks turned to stars but no planet loomed before them.

Ben froze.

"This isn't Alderaan," Luke observed mildly, but no one was listening to him.

Ben was shouting. "Hondo—"

"Now, now, you understand, Kenobi," Hondo said, turned around quickly, snapped his blaster up from his side and stunned him. "You were offering a wonderful sum, but someone else is offering more for your head and, well," he shrugged, "It's just good business."

Luke stared at him, wide-eyed and suddenly terrified.

He glanced at the scopes—Hondo had shown him how to use them. There was a massive, wedge-shaped ship to their left, just to the side of the viewports.

Hondo winked at him and put away the blaster. "Don't you worry, little one, no one is going to hurt you! It's only Kenobi that Lord Vader wants, I doubt he'll care about a little squirt like yourself, no matter how wonderful your father was!"

He was lying.

Luke's fear ramped up a notch. He felt... cold...

A little light on the console began chiming. Hondo flicked a switch and a holo appeared of a scary-looking figure—droid?—with a mask.

The voice thundered. "Ohnaka. You have Kenobi?"

"Of course, my lord. Hondo always delivers, doesn't he?" He wagged his finger in an odd way; Luke could tell that this Vader was not amused.

"Apparently so. But—" Vader stiffened. Luke, against his will, squeezed his eyes shut when that cold doubled, and it seemed to double around him. "You are carrying someone else on your ship."

"Oh, no one, just a little boy Kenobi picked up in his wanderings, a stray. Nothing to worry about, Lord Vader. Now, about my payment—"

"I will be the judge of what I worry about, Ohnaka. Bring him to the holo."

"My lord—"

"Bring him."

Hondo swallowed, the only sign of fear he'd shown, and it made Luke even more scared. He tried to duck when the pirate reached for him, but a hand clamped down on his shoulder and he was dragged in front of the holoreceiver.

He looked up and automatically met that dark lord's eye... plates? "Hi."

Vader tilted his head. It was a pretty big head, so the tilting was obvious.

"What is your name, young one?" he asked, curiously softly.

Luke had no idea what was going on, but his aunt and uncle had not raised a liar.

"Luke Skywalker," he said.

That... cold... constricted, making it hard to breathe for a moment, Then it was inside him, his head, poking and prodding where it shouldn't, where it was rude, and Luke gave the mental equivalent of a shove and a tongue stuck out at it.

To his surprise, it retreated. A whisper of amusement and surprise lingered.

On the holo, Vader had not moved his helmet to gaze at anything other than Luke.

"We have you on our scopes, Ohnaka," he said. The ship shuddered. "We have a lock on you and will tractor you in to a hangar bay. Then you can bring me Kenobi, and..." He hesitated, his stare seeming to triple in its intensity.

"And bring me the boy."

.

"And that, my good friend," Hondo finished, "is how ten years ago, I accidentally gave Vader his son, without even realising it!"

Han stared.

And stared some more.

Then he shook his head, more out of pity than disgust, and said, "I'm too sober for this nonsense."

He left, ignoring Hondo's squawked protests behind him and met Chewie outside.

Chewie roared a question; Han gave a short, obligatory laugh.

"Ah, nothing. I think he's gone crazy. Talking about this kid, who was supposedly Vader's son... it's a lotta nonsense."

Chewie groaned his understanding, then gave Han the best news he'd heard all day: they had a client.

"Oh really?" Han asked as they approached the docking bay the Falcon was in, seeing a slim figure already waiting for them inside. "Who is it?"

Chewie inclined his head; Han turned to look. The figure was a boy—adult on a technicality, he supposed—with two droids trailing him: a gold, annoying-looking one and a blue astromech. The boy smiled when he saw Chewie and Han, but he looked... tense.

"Hi!" he said. "My name's Luke Skywalker."

Han did a double take at the name—but no. Hondo's story was too ridiculous, too far-fetched. He wasn't even going to think it.

The boy, though—Lord Vader's son, if that tall tale was to be believed—sharpened his smile a little, eyes flashing a little gold in the light.

Vader, he remembered belatedly, was supposedly able to read minds.

Skywalker rested a hand on the astromech's dome; it curled slightly, nails digging into the finish, with either tension or anticipation.

"I don't suppose I can purchase passage to Alderaan for myself and two droids?"

Prompts from this post, but I’m closed to prompts for now.

[girls-scenarios]

Could I please request list 1 prompt 5, 6 with Yena (Iz*one) maybe along the lines of R and Yena don't really get along and then R messes up when practicing some charms and doesn't realize it affected anyone until she goes to a Halloween party and Yena is all over R confessing how she's always liked R. P.s LOVE y'alls writing so much!

IZ*ONE’s Yena / Halloween Prompts

5. Witch!AU (of your choice) + 6. Person A accidentally charms Person B and now has to figure out how to reverse the spell

Admin Kiwi

A/N: Thanks for loving our writing, I hope that you enjoy!

All it had taken was one slip-up while trying to figure out how to charm your bed to be softer to completely change your life. One moment, Eunbi was whining that you were late to her Halloween party, and the next, your lifetime enemy Yena was in your arms, declaring her undying love for you.

“Uh. What’s going on?” You stood frozen as everyone stared, just as shocked as you were. That was because you had never gotten along with Yena. She had pulled a prank on you and it had been war since then, the two of you always arguing or trying to prank each other whenever you had the chance. Now, Yena, the girl who had once jumped over a couch just to argue with you, was hugging you. And she smelt like peppermint. “Is this some sort of prank?”

“What are you talking about, silly? I’m confessing to you!” She laughed loudly, right into your ear, and normally, you would have complained about how loud she was. Right now, you couldn’t even form a sentence, stuttering as your face bloomed a deep shade of red. “I’ve always liked you!” She beamed, and your legs buckled underneath you. You knew you had made a big, big mistake.

-

It took a minute for everything to settle down, but eventually, you ended up on Eunbi’s couch, trying to explain to everyone that yes, you were a witch (to the few who didn’t know already) and yes, you were pretty sure you’d accidentally charmed Yena. It was embarrassing to explain why you’d been trying to charm your bed to be softer, but eventually everyone understood that you’d tried a new charm without knowing the consequences. Now, your bed was still hard, and Yena was clinging to your arm.

“How did the charm work if you were all the way at home and Yena was already over here?” Eunbi asked, eyeing the other girl warily. Everyone was a little unnerved: it was like watching a clone of Yena. Sighing, you shook your head.

“To be honest, I don’t know. I have no idea what the spell I used even does.”

“It’s obvious that it’s mind control or something,” Chaeyeon said from the other side of the couch, gesturing to Yena. “I mean, she’d never acted like that before.”

“It could also be a truth spell,” Eunbi countered, and you felt your cheeks heat up. Trying not to look at Yena, you nervously cleared your throat.

“The point is, there are thousands of spells out there. It’s going to be hard to find the one I used, and even then, there’s no telling if I’ll be able to reverse the affects or not.”

“There’s no need to worry, you’ll get wrinkles on your beautiful face,” Yena said from beside you, touching your face and making you blush even harder as you tried to pull away. Yujin, sitting beside Eunbi on the couch, grinned widely.

“You know, the two of you actually make a really cute couple.”

“Shut up,” you hissed, embarrassed. You couldn’t let your secret crush get out, not when you had no idea what spell you’d used on Yena. “That’s not relevant.”

“Hey, where did you find this spell, anyway? You said you were using a new spell, right?” Eunbi leaned forward, quickly changing the subject before Yujin could tease you anymore. You frowned, thinking.

“Well, I got it on this website I always use to find new spells. But if it’s in there wrong, then it might not help us.”

“There’s a website for that?” Minju narrowed her eyes, confused, and Chaewon helpfully patted her girlfriend’s shoulder.

“There’s a website for everything babe.”

“It wouldn’t hurt to try, right?”

“You’re right, Eunbi.” You pulled out your phone and leaned away, trying to avoid Yena’s lips. Nervously, you swallowed and typed in the website, not wanting to focus on how close her face was to yours. Right now, you had research to do. It didn’t take you long to find the spell (as you’d bookmarked it for later) so you held it up for the other girls to see. “Here it is. The softening spell.”

“Mollislevus?” Chaeyeon squinted at the word, and you turned the phone back to you.

“Mollislevis, actually,” you said, and immediately, the couch softened under you, making everyone yelp in surprise.

“Huh, well,” Yujin said, blinking as she stood up, staring at the couch in shock. “It worked that time.”

You stared at the phone, confusion written all over your face. “Wait, then if it works, how did I mess it up and end up with this?” You pointed at Yena, and she pouted at you.

“Just accept my love!”

“No!”

“Maybe you mispronounced it the first time? Think back.” Eunbi took the phone from your hands as she spoke and you closed your eyes, trying to think. What had happened earlier in your room? What had you said?

“Oh!” Yujin’s loud yell made you jump as she snatched the phone from Eunbi’s hands and scrolled down a bit before showing it to you. “Did you accidentally say this instead?” On the phone was the similar word mollisverus. You swallowed as you read the description on the spell. “A spell to make someone reveal their true love.”

“I-I might have.”

“Then it’s like a truth serum!” The youngest girl grinned widely. “This means Yena is really in love with you!”

You immediately felt your face flush. “T-that’s-. Listen, we need to find a way to reverse this. This doesn’t seem right.”

“It’s just making her tell the truth. And plus, it’s kind of cute to watch, I’ve never seen her like this.” Chaeyeon pointed at Yena, who pouted again. “What’s the big deal?”

“The big deal is that we need to get her back to normal.” With a huff, your face still red, you took your phone back from Yujin and tapped on the spell, going to the information page. “It has to be here somewhere….”

“We’ll give you guys some privacy,” Eunbi suddenly said, standing up and brushing off her costume. She was obvious and couldn’t lie, so you knew as soon as she smiled what she was planning.

“Eunbi….”

“Have fun!” And with that, all the girls disappeared into the other rooms, leaving you alone with Yena. Sighing, you shook your head and went back to reading through the information, your mind racing. You’d had a crush on Yena for years. At some point during the rivalry, you’d started to notice how pretty she was, and how infectious her smile was, and how much you liked her laugh. It was weird, to start falling for an enemy, and you’d decided to just push the feelings down because they’d never come to anything. But now, here you were, with Yena right beside you, apparently telling you the truth: that she liked you too.

“(Y/N)?”

“Yeah?” You were too nervous to look over at her, keeping your eyes glued to your screen.

“Do you hate me?” Oh god, you needed to find this reversal spell fast.

“No. Why do you say that?”

“Because you haven’t said that you liked me back once.” Her voice sounded sad, and you swallowed, still unable to look at her.

“That has… nothing to do with hating or liking you.”

“Then what is it?”

Thankfully, you didn’t have to answer. Your eyes landed on the reversal spell and you let out a sigh of relief, sitting up straight and mouthing it to yourself before finally turning to look at Yena. It was a bit of a mistake, because she looked adorable and made your heart race, but you pushed through it.

“Veritatereditus.”

Yena froze. Blinked. Then looked down at her arms around yours and let out a suprised squeak, jumping back. “W-what the heck? (Y/N)?”

“Um.” You knew you were blushing as you cleared your throat. “Hello.”

“When did you get here? What’s going on?”

This was going to be a pain to explain. “So, it’s a long story. But basically, I messed up on a spell and ended up putting you into some sort of trance.”

“Hey! What the heck?” Yena looked down at her hands, eyes wide. “Did you turn me into a cat or something? Because that’s totally not cool!”

“I didn’t. Actually, uh, I accidentally put a spell on you that made you reveal your true love.” You said it quickly, like ripping off a bandage, and watched with bated breath as a range of emotions went across her face. At first, she seemed confused, eyebrows knitted together, but then her eyes started to widen and her mouth dropped open. Her cheeks flushed and she moved her mouth like she was trying to find words, but couldn’t, shocked speechless.

“What?” She finally said, gripping at the couch.

“You revealed your true love.” You knew you were blushing just as much as she was, and you kind of wanted to run out of the room. But you knew Eunbi would never forgive you if you did that, so you stayed put as Yena swallowed nervously.

“D-did I? What did I say?” She asked you quietly, like she was almost afraid to hear the answer.

“That you liked me. That you’ve always liked me.”

“Oh.” She let out a groan and buried her face in her hands. “I can’t believe this, I’m so sorry, I don’t know-.”

“Don’t be sorry.”

She looked up at you. “What?”

Clearing your throat, you twisted your hands together. You couldn’t believe that you were about to say this, but…. “Don’t be sorry. Because I like you too.”

“You… You do?”

“Yeah. And I have for a while.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

The two of you sat staring at each other for a moment before she let out a laugh of disbelief. “Oh my god. I can’t believe that this entire time we’ve been fighting, we’ve liked each other. We’re idiots.”

Usually, you’d argue with her. But this time, you just laughed as well, nerves finally beginning to face away. “Yeah, no kidding.”

“I’m still annoyed that you cast a spell on me, though.”

“Sorry about that….”

She grinned, and your heart jumped into your throat as she raised her eyebrows. You knew what this meant. “I have a way you can repay me though.”

With your heart pounding in your chest, you found yourself smiling too. All it had taken was a spell to change your life. But you wouldn’t say that it was a bad thing.

“And how’s that?”

“Kiss me.”

[lovemesomerafael]

Others Like Me                                Chapter 14: The Tower

       Chapters 1 - 10   Chapter 11  Chapter 12   Chapter 13  

                                      Read It On AO3

“For what it’s worth, he’s genetically identical to our Barnes,” Bruce says.  “He doesn’t scar any more than ours does, but there is evidence on the scans that he’s had some of the same injuries as our Barnes.  And there’s also evidence that he’s been through something like what he describes with this Hydra.”

“Like what?” Clint asks.

“I haven’t spent much time on the arm itself, that’s Stark, but the way it’s attached?  It’s a nightmare. That thing’s gotta hurt every minute.  It looks like it’s been worked on, and it’s nice work.  But there are some ways he’s healed that are just the best his body could do.  It’s clear that it was originally attached very differently, crudely, with a lot of attention to making sure he could feel with the arm and hand, but almost no attention to the way the arm itself would feel to him.”

“Shit,” Natasha hisses.

They’re sitting around the large, oval table in the conference room, with the scans Bruce is describing hovering above the center.  Tony has called this meeting to decide what the hell they’re supposed to do with Bucky.  Marya is purposely not in the room, although she’s made it abundantly clear that she’s furious about that.  Tony ended up having to make her nonattendance a direct order and require her to agree, in the presence of Jarvis, that she would not listen in.  Now that they’d discovered her back door to the camera feed from the brig, it was the only way to ensure that she couldn’t sweet-talk or hack Jarvis into helping her again.

“It gets worse,” Bruce continues. “We all know the kinds of injuries Barnes has had. Lotta breaks, lotta organ damage, right?”

“I feel like I get stabbed more than is really fair, too,” Barnes muses.

“Well this guy, his scans make yours look pristine.  Even with super healing, his body shows the marks of a hell of a life.”

“What are you saying, Banner?”  Tony asks, scowling.

“I’m saying that his scans are telling the same story his mouth is. Everything physical we’ve looked at is consistent. Down to the permanent thickening of his skull where he says that ‘emptying’ machine attached. It looks just like Marya’s, only worse.  Much worse.”

“I don’t think Marya needs to know that,” Natasha notes.   Sam huffs disgustedly, but stays mute.

Tony lifts his chin from the hand it’s been resting on, two fingers splayed across his cheek in his characteristic ‘listening to things he doesn’t want to hear’ pose. “Anything else?”

“That’s about it.”

“Well, the arm’s interesting,” Tony says.  “It’s Stark tech, for the most part, but the materials and some of the features are pure Wakanda.  Shuri confirmed it.  T’Challa is outraged; he wants to disembowel whoever stole Wakandan secrets.”

Natasha sighs.  “T’Challa’s so hot when he talks about disembowelment.”

“You didn’t tell him about Bucky, did you?”  Sam asks.

Tony answers with a glare so disdainful only Tony Stark could achieve it.

Clint is squatting on his seat, as he always does, no matter how often Sam tries to explain to him how chairs work.  “What about the switch?”

All eyes turn back to Tony, who doesn’t answer for a moment.  Instead, he picks up the switch from the table in front of him and looks at it thoughtfully.  He’s clearly troubled.  

“Tony?”  Natasha prods.

“It’s a little different from Marya’s.  The design, the way it works, is the same.  It’s got a couple of upgrades I approve of.  But it’s a little crude.  Not as well-made as hers.”

Sam waves a hand toward the switch.  “Which is entirely consistent with Bucky having made it himself, using Stark’s design.  Just like he said.  Look, I’m ready to vote.  I believe the guy.”

“Just, slow your roll a minute,” Tony instructs him.  “Nat?  You’re the human lie detector, what do you think?”

“I got nothin’, Stark.  He’s consistent, he’s got no tells…  I have absolutely nothing that says he’s lying.”

“But…?”  Clint rolls his eyes.

“But this Hydra he says trained him.  They sound a lot like the Red Room.  I’m consistent and I don’t have any tells, either.”

“Which I keep telling her, is completely circular.  She can’t base not believing his story on the story itself. Either you believe it or you don’t.”

“Not true.  Legends are much more effective when there’s as much truth to them as possible.  This guy was trained by somebody.  He’s gotta know we’d spot that.  So he builds it into his legend and explains it away.”

Clint makes a disgusted sound.  

“Guess we know where you stand, huh, Clint?”  Sam asks hopefully.

“I don’t know.  What I know is that we’re fucked here.  There’s no way to prove or disprove his story, because according to Stark and Banner’s multiverse Theory, there’s a universe where this guy has all the same physical attributes, even though he’s not the Barnes from Marya’s universe.  In which case-“

“He comes from right here,” Tony snaps, cutting Clint off.  “He’s a spy.  Somebody’s trying to infiltrate the Avengers Initiative, and they know about Marya, so they built themselves a Barnes to get to us through her.”

“He’s a genetic duplicate, Tony,” Bruce argues.  “Nobody has cloning technology that can-“

Tony scoffs.  “Oh, so you’re Team Bucky now?”

“I’m Team Science.”

It goes on like that for quite a while, as lines begin to be drawn between those who believe Bucky is who he says he is – Sam and Bruce – and those who don’t – Natasha and Tony.  Clint wavers back and forth.  When Tony mentions that, it suddenly becomes clear to everyone that Barnes has said almost nothing throughout the meeting.

“Hey, Cap, you wanna-“

“Told you not to call me that,” Barnes snarls, low and menacing.

“Sorry,” Tony says quickly.  “You wanna weigh in here?  You got kind of a unique perspective, I’d say.”

“Maybe,” Barnes says quietly.  “But I got nothin’ to say right now.  I’m listenin’ to all of you, I’m weighin’ the evidence.  I’m not ready to vote.”

“This can’t go on forever, Barnes,” Natasha tells him.  “He’s a prisoner.”

“Ain’t like we got him in a gulag, Nat.  And he said himself he’s willing to be patient.”  Barnes looks up at the faces around the table.  “We gotta get this right.  Because I think we all know that if we decide he’s a threat, we can’t just let him go with a stern warning.”

That silences everyone for a few moments.  Some of them exchange troubled glances, others avoid eye contact.  Because they all know what Barnes is saying.  If Bucky’s a threat, he can’t be allowed to leave the Tower.  Not with all that he knows.  And their choices narrow down to two very unpleasant options.

Barnes gets up from the table.

“Where are you going?”  Tony asks, annoyed.

“I hate meetings.  You know that.  I’m going to the gym.  Think I’ll see if Bucky wants to spar.”  Something in his voice, and the look he gives Tony as he says it, is vaguely threatening. Whatever he has in mind, it’s not a simple workout.

“Now, this I gotta see,” Sam smiles.

“No,” Barnes says sharply.  “You don’t. Everybody stays the fuck out of the gym until I say different.  And Jarvis?”

“Yes, Captain.”

“You broadcast anything from in there and I promise you, I will do shit to your hard drive that’ll make you develop emotions just so you can cry. You feel me?”

“Understood, Captain.”

*****

In the gym, Bucky is standing in front of Barnes, leaning on a rack of hand weights, watching Barnes tape his hands.  He’s explained that he tapes his hands because he hates breaking his fingers, which used to happen all the time with Steve.  Barnes expects it’ll be the same with Bucky, because Barnes wants a full-on match.  Bucky hates broken fingers, too, but it never occurred to him to tape his hands.  He considers trying it, but in the end, he doesn’t bother. He’s got other things on his mind.

They’re both uncomfortable, but for very different reasons.

Barnes isn’t at all sure it’s smart to invite a prisoner, a potential spy and a man he knows is dangerous as all hell, to beat the crap out of him if he can.  He’s not even sure what he hopes to accomplish.  He wonders if this isn’t the biggest mistake he’s made yet as Captain America, and wishes for about the two millionth time today that Steve was here. Steve would advise asking Tony to suit up and stand guard.  Barnes is disgusted about twenty-seven ways by the fact that, if Steve were here, he would take that advice and mock Steve the whole time for being a grandma.  Because it would be good advice.  Barnes is in a world of hurt if Bucky goes off and he has no backup.  But he can’t make himself ask Tony to do it.  Shit, how much of his badass reputation is built on nothing more than bitching that he didn’t need Steve to protect him, while Steve took the heat and protected him anyway?

Bucky, for his part, is struggling to hide his internal chaos.  His fight-or-flight response is so powerful right now, it’s almost painful.  He can’t shake the persistent warning sparking through his entire body, screaming that this is a trap.  If Barnes was Hydra, it would have been.  Bucky knows full well what happens when you raise a hand to your captors.  It’s all well and good to crush a minion or two on occasion; Hydra had plenty of those.  Hydra brass actually thought it was kind of cute when the Asset did that.  But Barnes has authority here.  He is not a minion.  And if Bucky takes the bait and he’s wrong…  He stands glowering at the floor, deep lines etched in his face as he endures a waking nightmare as real as it was when it really happened.

“Hey!”  Barnes calls, sharp and loud.

Bucky’s head jerks up and he damn near responds in Russian.

“The fuck did you go?” Barnes asks, genuinely concerned.

But Bucky’s not about to acknowledge the flashback.  “I, uh… Nowhere.  Tryin’ to figure out what to call you, is all.  I ain’t callin’ you Jim.”

“Says the asshole who calls himself Bucky.”

Barnes’ grin is actually a little reassuring.  It probably shouldn’t be – God knows Bucky could invent some unspeakable tortures if he had a mind to, which means this guy is just as twisted - but it is.  

“Stick with Barnes. It’s what everyone uses, anyway.”

“Fuck you.  That’s my name.”

“Listen, you got clear title to Bucky, pal.  I ain’t goin’ near that.”  He stands up and motions for Bucky to follow him to the middle of the huge mat covering much of the floor of the gym.  

“So, this sparring, there any rules?”  Bucky asks, trying like hell to seem nonchalant.

“No killing.  No destroying the gym, unless you wanna listen to Stark whine.  That’s about it.”

Bucky is absolutely not reassured by that, but he doesn’t get the opportunity to spool up any tighter about it, because the next thing he knows, he’s on his ass on the mat. Barnes has swept his legs out from under him and is just beginning to reach for Bucky’s throat when Bucky’s instincts take over.  

Bucky expected Barnes to reach for his throat.  So before he has a chance to get hold of him, Bucky flips to his feet and takes advantage of Barnes’ position to land a left uppercut that sends Barnes flying at least ten feet backward.  Bucky rushes him, which Barnes somehow also expects.  Stunned but spinning quickly to avoid him, Barnes gets behind Bucky and uses his momentum to throw Bucky headlong into the padded wall several feet away. In two moves, they’ve covered over thirty feet.  Suddenly, the gym seems kind of small.  

Bucky springs away from the wall, circling to get himself some room.  Barnes circles, too, and the two grin at each other from identical defensive crouches.  

“No killing, don’t bust up the gym.  Those really the only two rules?”  Bucky asks.

“Why, you want to add some? Make sure I don’t shame you too bad?”

“Nope,” Bucky says, grinning evilly.  “Just checkin’.”  He crosses the distance between them in a blur of speed and grasps Barnes, ready to yeet him into the wall across the room.  But Barnes sees it coming and, instead, Bucky’s suddenly on his back with Barnes on top of him, scrambling to get control of his arms.  Before he can, Bucky gets a foot under his gut and heaves Barnes six feet in the air and double that backwards.  Barnes crashes into the opposite wall, and both of them spring back into their defensive stances.  

The next few minutes are a dizzying kaleidoscope of punches and kicks, interspersed with balletic leaps and a steadily increasing level of trash talk.  Barnes can already tell that Bucky is the best opponent he’s ever fought. And Bucky now understands that Barnes’s offer to spar had been legitimate.  Neither one of them knows when they start laughing, but it’s early in the fight.  

There’s a lot of punching, but less than you might think, because they’re just too good at predicting each other’s moves.  Kicking’s like that, too, but at least there, they each know a few moves the other doesn’t. Both of them get some good body throws in, especially when the other tries to attack, because that, too, is predictable.  The intended victim, anticipating it, can use the motion against the attacker.  That quickly becomes a little frustrating.  They have essentially the same moves.  They have the same instincts.  They see each other’s next strike coming too easily.  Which is why training and technique give way, and their sparring match devolves into a street brawl.

At some point, Barnes runs Bucky into the rack of hand weights, which goes over in a very loud, very heavy crash.  Something’s wrong with Bucky’s left arm after that.  It’s also Barnes who throws Bucky into a wall high enough that, as he scrabbles for purchase while he’s falling, Bucky pulls the padding down with him.  The custom wooden racks that hold balance balls, yoga mats, foam rolls, jump ropes, and other equipment collapse when Bucky sends Barnes flying into them, face first.  That’s also how Barnes’ nose gets broken.  

It’s Bucky who picks up the treadmill to use as a shield but, in his defense, Barnes was the one who threw a fifty-pound hand weight at him, and it would’ve hurt if it had hit him. They know that because it totally destroys the treadmill.  They’re both responsible for the destruction of the weight bench, which was not meant for two supersoldiers to land on it simultaneously at full force, arms locked around each other’s necks.  But they never do agree whose fault it is that Barnes’s metal arm goes through one of the floor-to-ceiling windows, shattering it.  

So yeah, they only keep the no-killing rule.  By the time Barnes gives Jarvis the all-clear to unlock the doors, Tony’s gym is in ruins. Neither of the combatants had expected every single member of the team to come pouring into the room as soon as the locks released, but that’s only because they didn’t realize that the resounding thuds and crashes of their antics could be felt four floors in either direction.

The team slows, then creeps toward them, gaping at the carnage and peering amongst the debris to determine whether either of them has survived.  There’s blood in several places on the fourteen-foot high ceiling, and some of it is in the shape of bodies.  There’s wind whistling through the hole in the window, and it’s swaying the few light fixtures that survived, most of which are broken, including the one with a bloody jump rope wrapped around it.  The wall padding and the mat on the floor are torn beyond repair, which is fine because those bloodstains aren’t coming out, anyway.  The stuffing from inside the mats is everywhere.  Tony whimpers as he takes in the devastation.

Bucky’s laid out across the wreck of a machine the whole team uses to do exercises against hydraulic resistance, and Barnes is under what’s left of a rowing machine, somehow tangled up in the plastic scraps of what used to be an exercise ball.  They’re both bloody and bruised, each with a few broken bones that they know about.  Later, when Bruce insists on full body scans, they’ll discover Barnes also has a cracked femur.  They’re sweaty and exhausted, and their identical smiles are gleeful, if bloody, as they gasp for breath.  

“This is why we can’t have nice things,” Tony moans.  

Both Barnes and Bucky cackle maniacally, before Bucky coughs wetly and groans.

“Bucky,” Bruce says tentatively, like he’s talking to a spooked animal.  “That red under you, is that blood, or another burst exercise ball?”

Bucky groans again, before answering thickly, “Prob’ly blood.  Don’t tell Barnes, but I got one of these bars through my chest.”

Bruce and Marya rush to him while Barnes begins laughing hysterically.  “You got stabbed by that thing?  What a pussy!”

“Yeah, you might wanna reserve judgment, there, Captain Oblivious,” Clint drawls, indicating Barnes’s leg.  

Barnes looks down to see that one of the oarlocks of the rowing machine has been broken from its mounting and is embedded in the meat of his left thigh.  “Dammit!”  He shrieks.

Now it’s Bucky laughing hysterically.

 Bruce, perhaps a little affected by the depth of Tony’s enraged despair at the state of his gym, is uncharacteristically autocratic about medical care for both Barnes and Bucky.  He gives them no options, but orders the rest of the team to help him strap them both to gurneys and haul them to the medical floor.

Over time, Marya’s learned to live with her terror of anything medical, developed as a result of her time as Hydra’s expendable soldier, slave, and experimental subject.  One of the ways Bruce has helped her do that is to teach her to assist him.  She’s gotten to the point where she doesn’t mind providing medical care, although she still dreads and resists receiving it.  When they reach the large trauma room on the medical floor, Bruce begins to bark instructions to her.

Barnes tries to object. “Not happening, Banner.  Get Sam to help you.  I don’t want Marya in here with him.”

Seeing Marya look to Bruce, Barnes cries, “Don’t look at him.  You don’t answer to him, you answer to me.”

“Not in here, she doesn’t,” Bruce says mildly.  “Marya, get an IV started, too.”

Barnes argues and threatens for a while, as Bruce and Marya ignore him.  Bruce conducts scans while Marya assesses wounds and administers first aid.  

“This is insubordination,” Barnes mutters grumpily as she cuts off his shorts to get to the large wound the broken oarlock has made in his thigh.

“I know, Captain,” she coos sympathetically.  “You’ll feel better once the morphine starts to work.”  

Bucky watches her hungrily. He’s in significant pain, but he’s long ago learned how to ignore that.  He waits impatiently while she cleans and bandages Barnes’s leg, wanting her to come back and stand next to him, to touch him again.  He’s drowsy from the pain medication Bruce has given him, and unaware of the goofy, dreamy smile on his face as he follows Marya with his eyes.

Barnes sees it, though, and scowls.  He only relaxes when Bucky’s eyes drift closed as the morphine takes a hold of him.

“I don’t know if you are my Sergeant, but you are definitely James Barnes,” Marya scolds Bucky as she cuts his shirt from his body, jolting him back to consciousness.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”  Barnes asks from the other exam table.

“Nothing complimentary,” Marya mutters.

Bucky grins at her.  “It’s worth it, getting my ass kicked, to get to see you.”

“So you admit I kicked your ass!”  Barnes shouts.

“Shut up and quit moving,” Bruce rebukes him.  “You’re blurring my scans.”

Marya’s hands are firm and sure as she begins to clean and examine the stab wound in Bucky’s chest.  He likes the practiced way she goes about her work, and the adorable wrinkles between her eyebrows as she concentrates.  

“I need something to call you,” she says, glancing up from her work to look into his eyes.  “I will not call you Sergeant, so I suppose I’ll have to call you Bucky.”

“But you said-“

“I said that I could not call the Zimniy Soldat Bucky. But I don’t know that you are the Zimniy Soldat.”

“That makes a weird kind of sense.”

“One of us should have some.  The two of you clearly don’t.”

Bucky’s grin widens and he feels a bloom of warmth in his chest that has nothing to do with the hole in his flesh and everything to do with the fondly exasperated look she’s giving him.  

“This chest wound is going to take a few layers of stitching,” Marya tells Bruce over her shoulder.  “I’ll get everything ready for you.”

“Don’t knock me out, though,” Bucky pleads.  “If this is the only time they’ll let me see you, I want to be awake.”

“Knock him the hell out,” Barnes growls.  

Unfortunately for Bucky, Bruce insists on sedating him as he repairs the stab wound.  Although Bucky will heal even without it, this universe’s Bruce is just as stubborn about proper medical care as the one from Bucky’s universe. Which means his time with Marya is cut disappointingly short.

*****

Bruce requires both Barnes and Bucky to remain on the medical floor overnight.  Once their injuries are treated and they’re stable, Bruce puts them both in one large room.  Since there are six private rooms on the floor, everyone is perfectly aware that making them share is punishment for their reckless stupidity in injuring each other and destroying the gym.  Both Barneses realize, too late, that they should have hidden the fact that it had been so much fun.    

Tony backs Barnes in requiring that Marya leave the medical floor now that the regular medical staff have arrived. Bucky’s disappointed, but not surprised.

As evening falls, there’s really nothing to do while they heal except talk.  The longer the groggy, intermittent conversation goes, the clearer it is to Bucky that something’s changed between them.  Barnes is willing to be much more open with him than any of them have been thus far. He would attribute some of that to morphine, except that he knows how good he, himself, is at keeping his mouth shut, even when under the influence of something.  

“It’s not getting better.  We’re basically putting out fires,” Barnes was saying.  “They call themselves the Ten Rings. Run by some shithead calls himself The Mandarin. Slippery fucker.  Absolutely ruthless.  Nat almost caught up with him once, but he ghosted.  Haven’t gotten close since.”

“That sucks.”

Barnes’s face went hard.  “Doesn’t matter.  Because if it’s the last thing I do, I gotta take them down.  Especially that Mandarin motherfucker.”  Barnes hisses, “He’s the one who killed Steve.”

Bucky can see that Barnes’s rage is never far below the surface.  “What, exactly, happened?”

“Ask someone else, man,” Barnes sighs.  “I don’t wanna talk about that.”

“Yeah.  I get it.”

There’s a lull then, the air thick with memories as cherished as they are excruciating.  After a while, Barnes practically whispers, “We were married, anyone tell you that?”

“Fuck!  No.”

“Yeah.  Dumbass finally says yes, then he gets himself killed.”

“Shit, I’m sorry.”

“Yeah.”

They go quiet again, the ghost of Steve Rogers palpable between them as they both remember, and ache.  It’s a therapeutic, in a way, just sitting here, grieving together the man they’ve both loved since they knew what love was.  The man they both still love with a savage, tormented violence.  Different though the circumstances were, they can each still fully understand the other’s grief at losing him.  They’re not talkers.  They don’t want, need, or even know how to speak their sorrow.  But as they lie there, lost for the moment in pain, they somehow realize that in this bizarre situation, there’s also absolutely no need.  To tell each other how they feel would be redundant.

An hour goes by in total silence.  Barnes is the first to break it, and it’s clear his thoughts have returned to the Ten Rings threat.  “Thing is, without Steve, we got even less chance than we had before, and we were already fucked.  They get bolder every damn time.”

Bucky catches the thread immediately.  “Yeah, I noticed there are a lot of terrorist attacks here. Lot more than in my universe.”  

“Yeah?”

“By maybe a factor of ten.  First thing I saw when I crash-landed here was that blown-out resort in Singapore.”

“Yeah, that was them.  The Ten Rings.  They wanted to disrupt Singapore’s economy.”

“Seems to have worked, if the exchange rate is any indication.”

“Oh, it worked, all right.  Bastards.”

“I wish I could help you.  I was jealous as hell when you guys flew off on your mission.  Haven’t felt that in a while.”

“What, you lose interest in fighting?  After Steve?”

“Lost interest in livin’, pal.  Sorry to be so blunt.”

“Nah.  Don’t apologize.  If I didn’t have those morons upstairs...  I wouldn’t have gotten through this last year without them.  Didn’t want to.  They dragged me back to life, kicking and screaming.  I don’t know how you did it without them.”

There was no shred of doubt or pretense in Barnes’s voice, and he was looking at Bucky as he said it.  Bucky’s eyes flew open and he turned to Barnes.  “You believe me.”

Barnes frowned and hesitated before saying, “I believe that you’re another me somehow. That multiverse thing’s as good a reason as any, I guess.  And Stark says it’s theoretically possible.  I believe you’re telling the truth about what you’ve been through.  Do I believe you’re the me that Marya knew?  I don’t know.  I just… I don’t know.  And that’s the thing.  She’s such a part of things here, I can’t take the risk that you’re not.  I know what she’s capable of.  I know how she feels about her Sergeant, and I also know there’s nothing she won’t do for someone she’s loyal to.”

Bucky grinned.  “Not to mention how polite and respectful of authority she is, all the while she’s disobeying your direct orders behind your back.”

“And she’s so fucking sweet about it you can’t stand to discipline her.”

“Even when she tells you to your face she’d do it again.”

Barnes and Bucky shake their heads, identical fond smiles on their faces as they roll their eyes in unison.

“That’s one of the reasons Stark leads the team, you know.  Some people think that role should go with the shield.  I don’t.  It should go to the one most capable, and Stark’s been here since the beginning.  That’s the main reason, but…  Not gonna lie, Marya’s another.  He can say no to her, enforce consequences when she steps out of line. Me, I just …”  Barnes huffs a laugh and shrugs helplessly.

And that’s when Bucky realizes that Barnes is in love with Marya.